S.A.D. No Longer

I can still recall picking up a copy of the Daily Universe my sophomore year at BYU with a large color photograph of a few bitter, yet defiant looking students proclaiming February 14th as "S.A.D." Those of you who are not familiar with this acronym either 1.) Don't care a hoot about Valentine's Day (in which case you are probably male) 2.) Already have a significant other or 3.) Have never attended BYU and are therefore unfamiliar with its peculiar dating culture. Let me enlighten you: S.A.D. stands for "Singles Awareness Day," and anyone who has ever been lonely on the Day of Love knows that it can be very sad indeed. Although I will admit to being disappointed on February 14th, I have never been the embittered female/man hating/I'll-revel-in-my-singleness type, and instead for most of my life I have simply tried to tell myself that Valentine's Day is probably not all it's cracked up to be anyway.

This year, however, for the first time in my life, I had a Valentine-- and the day could hardly have been any better. In the morning we were able to attend the Provo Temple and then we braved the snow to buy groceries for our special dinner. In the afternoon we finally got around to returning some Christmas gifts at the Mall and then headed over to the movie theater to watch the new 3-D stop motion movie, Coraline. Boy, 3-D movies sure have come a long way. Gone are the old paper glasses with the cellophane red and green lenses. We were handed what looked like sunglasses in their very own individually wrapped, sanitary plastic bags. The movie itself had a very interesting plot, and if anyone tries to tell you it's creepy-- believe them! But we enjoyed it nevertheless.

The credit for our dinner idea has to go to Mom and Dad, who gave us a fondue pot for Christmas. We made an oriental beef broth fondue and enjoyed cooking sirloin steak, shrimp, asparagus, yellow squash, broccoli, and baby bella mushrooms. And since there was only the two of us, we each got four forks--which makes the wait quite a bit shorter! We also had a couple homemade dipping sauces and cold bottled Apple Beer. To top it all off, we had homemade mint oreo milkshakes.

We exchanged small gifts and then fell asleep watching The Sword in the Stone. It was a wonderful day-- probably just because I got to spend it all with the person I love the most. So, in the end I have to say that Valentine's Day really is all it's cracked up to be once you've found that special someone, and I'm blessed to declare I'm S.A.D. no longer :)