A Valentine's Day Lament/Lesson

By: Alex 

Art by Alex

When I was 11 years old, I got my first real valentine. I walked into my fifth grade classroom on Valentine’s Day with my biggest expectation being that people would stop attaching lollipops to their valentine’s cards and start giving out chocolate. Instead, I was surprised to see my desk adorned with gifts from a secret admirer.

This was a great feeling… someone liked me. I felt invincible. It was just another step up on that ever-intimidating social ladder of public school. I read the card, and realized this gift was from Gary*, a boy I barely knew. But nevertheless, my 11-year-old mind immediately put myself into a serious, committed relationship.

From Valentine’s Day on, our relationship consisted of us writing notes to each other in the bathroom in between classes and giving them to our liaison friends who would deliver the notes to the recipient. Most of what I knew about Gary was through what he wrote to me in his 11-year-old penmanship. 


Still, though Gary and I never had any real communication, I felt powerful. People looked at me differently because I had a ‘boyfriend.’ Other girls were jealous of me because someone liked me and other boys wanted to get to know me because I was taken, and therefore, more desirable. I loved this attention. I thought this was the height of luxury. But it seemed to slip my mind that I didn’t truly have a real relationship with Gary. I just went along for the ride of popularity, excited for what the title of being someone’s ‘girlfriend’ would bring to me. 

Maybe we were just intimidated, but we continued communicating through notes until around March when our silence was broken; our science teacher put us in the same lab group, so we were forced to take the next step in our relationship—actually talking face to face.

Because of that fateful day in science, Gary and I got the opportunity to (finally) speak to each other. But though we had this new step to our relationship, I realized we had nothing to talk about. It was really sad, all of the excitement leading up to this moment-- gifts, attention, notes, and then nothing. Why did I glamorize the idea of a relationship?

I didn’t like that I was spending so much time with someone I really didn’t enjoy hanging out with. I no longer had the 11-year-old freedom that I loved. I realized that I had a lot of friends that I didn’t associate myself with anymore, just because of my obligation to Gary. I wasn’t myself.

I realized I hadn’t hung out with Josh* or Paul*, my two best guy friends who I used to watch Batman and talk about dinosaurs with. Where were they? I’d forgotten about them. And my best friend Brianna*, we hadn’t had a sleepover in so long. I distanced myself from my real friends who I actually had connection with, all because of this romantic chase. And I finally got there and it wasn’t actually that great.

Slowly, I drifted away from Gary, mostly because I was a little freaked out about what was happening. Now, I talk about this relationship like it was the worst experience in the world. It wasn’t. It gave me a chance to realize what I really wanted. From that premature relationship, I realized that I hated being tied to someone, being responsible for spending time with them, especially when I wanted to do other things that I enjoyed more.

To this day, I get freaked out in relationship situations because I truly don’t know what to do if someone wants to spend all of their time with me and I’m expected to do the same. From my first relationship, I learned that, especially growing up, we all need time to figure things out for ourselves, and it’s really hard to do that when we’re trying to please someone else. Being free from the responsibility of a relationship allowed me to get to know myself a lot better and be more confident in what I want out of a relationship.

Nowadays, I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m proud to be single, but I’m glad that I am---right now. I realize now that Gary and I were not the perfect match, as I thought back then. I was ‘dating’ him just to say I dated someone. Of course, neither of us treated one another badly, but we never really had a connection. At that age (and even now) people put so much pressure on labels and conformity, that it’s easy to fall into a relationship like mine and Gary’s. I see it today even with people my age.

My advice is, don’t use a relationship as a confidence booster. It’s not fair to you or your partner, and sooner or later, it’ll just end badly. Luckily, 11-year-olds don’t get their hearts broken as easily, and a relationship can end just by getting a new seat assignment in your classroom. But just because this happened to me in fifth grade, doesn’t make teens immune to it. Remember that you have the power. You don’t have to be with anyone you don’t want to be, and on the other side, you can make time for the people you care about. Finding a match is not that scary; it’s just difficult. But I can promise, if you wait with confidence, caution, and a little bit of optimism, one of these days, Valentine’s Day will be the best holiday of the year.

*Names have been changed to protect the innocent.