A frugal husband makes for a fun dad on Valentine’s Day

As a parent of five children and an owner of one aging house, Valentine’s is that mid-winter rainy day for which I find myself soaking wet because my fiduciary reality has always been less meteorological and more astronomical.

I suppose I should be thankful that things seem to breakdown whenever I get a little ahead. Take for example last year’s tax refund – TV, washer, and refrigerator – all kaput within days of each other.
It seems any budget surplus I’ve ever experienced has been liquidated faster than a barfly on St. Patrick’s Day.

To keep our head above the flood waters, we focus on the unavoidable capital outlays throughout the fiscal year: insurance, utilities, taxes, mortgage, and the most demanding of them all: kids.
Then there are those other “unavoidables” where return must be weighed heavily against investment.

Valentine’s Day is one of those debits in the spreadsheet of life.

So, in these times of recession, I proclaimed to my adoring wife, we all must make sacrifices. Frivolous expenditures need to be, if not cut entirely, certainly timed back or deferred. But frivolous may have not been the right word, I said in response to the charming glare I received as she left the room.

Although I consider myself quite a romantic guy, I realize our current economy forces a working guy to consider his investment options very carefully when it comes to the lovers holiday.

Current economic conditions inhibit the acquisition of gifts that are consumable. These include going out to dinner and surprising her with the predictable heart of chocolate. Yes, these things contain lofty direct profits, but they are short term and what we’re looking for here is durable assets.
The flower du jour for this “holiday” is the expensive rose. I ask why not milkweed or dandelion. And what’s worse, roses are sold by the dozen. Sure, I could be one long-stem rose. That was fine when I was just out of college struggling to make ends meet. Now that I’m in my 40’s struggling to make ends meet, a single rose is just pathetic.

Diamonds are the raison d’être, the big kahuna of Valentine’s Day gifts and they offer significant returns. However, it is a hefty out-of-pocket venture with one big caveat emptor: size matters.
There are the lesser stones, your sapphires, emeralds, satin gypsums, but they are more like generic cereal at the breakfast table of jewelry. Just see what happens when you slam a box of Capt. Munch in front of your brand savvy kids.

Gold is generally a safe commodity. Its immediate value is quite high with a rapid return of investment, but that value can fade into the oblivion of the jewelry box as fashion dictates that next best gift. Then the initial venture depreciates into sentimental value which may spike periodically when cleaning out the jewelry box. It’s true that gold will always have its market value, but even the suggestion of liquidating unworn jewelry will surely cause a melt-down of another sort all together.

While there are many other choices to take stock in for us romantic but thrifty types – coffee mugs, gift baskets, books of poetry, bath salts, beer-of-the-month club – investor beware: A bear in the bull market of Valentine’s Day must advance cautiously in hopes his acquisition compounds a great deal of interest for his beneficiary lest your tear sheets bring about sheets of tears.

So to ease the undue pressures of Valentine’s Day, my wife and I have decided that it is all about the kids. We’ll run to the dollar store for some decorations and candy hearts with little sayings. We’ll make some pancakes in the shape of hearts, and maybe even a cake with pink icing and red and white sprinkles.
And there will be a little surprise for my wife, too, because I am not a complete idiot.
from http://www.nj.com/parenting/index.ssf/2013/02/a_frugal_husband_makes_for_a_f.html

Valentine's Day Fear

Like many rationally thinking men, I am absolutely terrified of Valentine’s Day, this year more than most.  My reasons are many, and while I could go as far back as to third grade and the Hong Kong Phooey Valentine incident, for brevity I’ll start a little later.

On Valentine’s Day, 1979, I decided to write Candy a poem.

I was in high school and had developed a deep crush on Candy.  She was somewhat plain looking, tall, thin build, short brown hair, thick glasses.  I remember how I loved her long slender fingers.  I don’t know why I liked them, I just did. 

Her parents owned a small arts and crafts store down the street from where I grew up.  Many evenings, as she sat behind the counter in the mostly empty store, we’d sit and talk about many profound and meaningful subjects.  We spent much time together, talking, laughing, enjoying each other’s company.  And while I saw her as the love of my life, she saw me more as a little brother.  You see, she was a senior, while I was nothing but a lowly freshman.

So, on Valentine’s Day, I decided to write Candy a poem that would put it all out there.  I opened an emotional vein and bled such anguished adolescent sentiment that it couldn’t fail. 

I stood next to her watching as she read, studying her face for any reaction.  At first she looked confused and maybe just a little concerned, but then a huge smile grew across her face.  She looked at me straight in the eye and said, “This is really good.”  She looked at the poem and then back at me.  “Do you think I could use it to give to my boyfriend?”

I eventually recovered from the devastation of that episode, but it has served as a touchstone for Valentine’s Day ever since.

Avoidance has been my coping mechanism of choice when it came to Valentine’s Day.  It worked pretty well for a number of years, too.  The holiday’s winter placement made the flu a perfect out.  An annual bout of bronchitis kept me safe in solitude every 14^th of February. 

It wasn’t until I started dating Cheri, the girl who would end up being my wife, when I was roped in to – did I begin to celebrate the day.  But it was not without a lot of trepidation and a little tragedy.

Valentine’s Day had fallen on a Friday when Cheri was a sophomore at Temple University and I was living down at the Jersey shore.  When I got off work at four in the afternoon, I stopped at a florist and spent what little money I had on a dozen roses.  I planned to stop home, take a shower, and then head up to Philadelphia.

Just before I pulled in my driveway, it started to lightly snow.  I gently lay the roses in the trunk and went in.  Less than a half hour later, I stepped out of the shower and peered out the window at blizzard conditions.  Mother Nature had given me the perfect out when I finally didn’t need one.

Much to Cheri’s chagrin, I called to postpone our Valentine’s date.  Being a guy and an economizer of every step, I decided to keep the roses in the trunk.  I figured the florist stores them in a cooler, what harm could it do.

The next day, late in the afternoon when the main roads were clear, I drove up to Philadelphia.  I told her how sorry I was that we had missed our first Valentine’s Day together, but, if she would come out to the car with me, I was sure all would be forgiven.

I led her outside and proudly opened the trunk.  There we stared at a dozen roses fit for Morticia Addams.  They were practically black, wilted, and generally pathetic.  Apparently a cooler at a florist is not the same as a subfreezing trunk.  I would have told her to forget about the roses, that I was taking her to a romantic restaurant in the city, but I had spent most of my money on the now dilapidated flowers.  The best I could offer was some ice cream from the convenience store and maybe some M&Ms to sprinkle on top.

Fortunately, I have improved somewhat when it comes to Valentine’s Day.  For instance, I no longer buy super sized boxes of chocolates when just that morning my wife was complaining that her jeans felt a little tight.  I double check to make sure I actually sign the card I give her.  I also make sure to read the words closely before randomly underlining some to give them emphasis.  There is no good answer for why you underlined the word “but.”

This year, Valentine’s Day falls on a Tuesday, and I am just a little concerned.  Going out the weekend before is too early to really count and the weekend after is too late.  Sure, you can say that the date is in lieu of Valentine’s Day, but that will still leave an expectation of something on the actual day.  That means we guys must either go out on a Tuesday night – which no working person would wish on his worst enemy – or risk certain emotional annihilation. 

The whole situation makes me feel a little feverish.  Maybe I’ll luck out and it’ll be the flu.