Valentine

   My girl’s a little blue this year; she doesn’t have a boyfriend (or even an interesting crush), school has been very boring, the winter weather has everyone in the family feeling yuk. I’m not one to celebrate Valentine’s day, but I decided to do something to try to cheer her up.

   I have mixed feelings about store-bought flowers. I don’t hate them, I just don’t usually like them very much. Woman, you may be thinking, how are you going to create a hand-picked, local bouquet in the middle of February?

   Well, let’s see. One thing there’s a LOT of around here is teasel. Also spray paint. So . . roses?

Yes. Roses. Now let’s walk down to the creek bottom and see what else can be found.

   Answer: Swamp alder catkins, fern spore thingamabobs, red rose hips, spicebush twigs with scented buds showing, a purple raspberry cane, curly willow twigs, boxwood greens, hazelnut twigs with catkins, dried flowers of spirea . . . there’s potential, here. I hit the alder with a little white spray paint and started arranging. I could really, really use the gold spray paint i know I have somewhere, but I could not find it.

   Yes. This is good. Happy Valentine’s day to you, too, from the farm and me.

Feb 14, 2022

ps if you know what the fern spore thingamabobs are, feel free to let me know. I tried to look it up but failed.

Between Valentine’s Day and the Ides of March

  Sometimes around 1985, a Valentine’s gnome visited our house. For a month. And gave us candy.

   To set the story; my family lived in a farmhouse, fairly isolated. No close neighbors. I was sixteenish and my brother was ten. Our mother gave us a heart-shaped box of chocolates for Valentine’s day, some of which were pastel pink and yellow. Over the course of a few days, we noticed that the box, while not full, was also not becoming empty. It stayed around 80% full even though we kept eating them. In particular, if we took the last pink one, yellow one, whatever - when we looked later there would be more of that type there. Our mother, who was occasionally a prankster, denied knowledge. We had by this point eaten around twice as many chocolates as were originally in the box, and it was still 80% full. Our father did not truly approve of us eating candy, so we knew he was out, and our mother was a rather truthful person who did ‘fess up when asked direct questions - she swore she was not involved. Which left us with . . a Valentine’s gnome? An early-bird leprechaun? Who is freaking doing this??

   We staked out the box. Deliberately removed the last pastel-colored candies. An hour later, when at least three of us had been in the room at all times, the colored candies were restored to the box. The damn thing was sitting in plain sight on the hutch, and it was beginning to worry the hell out of all of us. Not that we stopped eating the chocolates. Now that I think about it, any reasonable person would have stopped eating these obviously supernatural chocolates. But. . they were sweet . . and, well. Chocolate. Everyone in the house was giving the box nervous looks at this point, but it refilled and refilled and refilled. 

   Until March 14th rolled around. That day we opened the Fateful Heart-shaped Box to find a poem fitted carefully under the lid. Handwritten on old paper in spiky, old-fashioned, unfamiliar handwriting. The writer hoped we had enjoyed the ‘little game’ and promised 

“Hope to see you all next year, 

Unless, by then, I’m far from here.”

   And that was the last we heard from him. Her. It. There was never a repeat incident. I still have the poem, and find it every bit as baffling today as I did them. Now and again, at this time of year, I think about it.