What Is It With Valentines?

I don't know if you've spent a lot of time in the greeting card aisle lately, but something odd is going on.

I first noticed it last year when I was trying to pick out a nice anniversary card for John. 

(I know, I know, artistic types like John and I are supposed to be whipping up beautiful homemade cards for each other - as I stated in a previous post, "Like we don't have enough to do.")

As I cruised through all the cards marked "Husband" I was having a tough time finding a nice one. Because so many of the cards had a sentiment like this "I know we haven't always had our fairytale ending, but we're still together and I love you anyway." 

I know you think I'm kidding but I'm not. Card after card said something similar. Then I found the cards that had about 6 paragraphs about true love - not expressing that this woman feels that her husband is her true love - simply stating the fact that, if you're lucky enough to find it, it's really, really wonderful. After reading all the previous cards, these cards now had the aura of faking it.

So I decided to check out the "Wife" cards and see if there was a similar trend.

Nope.

All those cards went on and on about "I can't imagine my life without you" or "You complete me". "I'm the luckiest man in the world."

What gives?

I can only deduce that there are a whole lot of crabby women out there who, for some reason, feel they could have done better, and a whole lot of men who feel at least they lucked out and someone said yes.

Or else there are a bunch of crabby women trying to send their husbands a message and a bunch of men just telling their wives what they want to hear.

Or else there is just one crabby woman writing all the cards and she is saying what she thinks everyone should be saying.

I forgot about it until the other day when I tried to find a nice Valentine and ran into the same thing all over again.

It's too late for you to check this theory on Valentines because at 12:01 on the dot all the Valentine cards were spirited away to be replaced with Easter cards (I know this because of the year I forgot to get a card and thought "No biggie, I'll just grab one tomorrow" - Ha!)

But, next time you're in the store, swing on over and check out the anniversary cards and let me know what you find.

In the meantime, I guess I'm back to making my own cards :-)