A Valentine Story
San Valentín, patron saint of epilepsy, beekeepers, courtly love, and Mexican summers
As I sit in the darkness of my home office conserving power on what will be one of the coldest and iciest evenings for a Valentine’s Day in Central Texas, I’m reflecting on its significance, or perhaps lack thereof, for me. Growing up on the border while mamá, a single parent, was working to give my sisters and me an opportunity for a better, easier future, Valentine’s Day didn’t have any history and seemed too costly. A luxury that mi familia could not afford, and for what? To exchange store-bought cards and candy with 30+ school children? Cards and candies with loving and friendly messages that seemed, at least to me, insincere.
You see, I felt my classmates did not like me, simply because I wasn’t like them. I could not speak like them, I could not dress like them, and, as some of them pointed out, I was not welcomed in this country. So, while mamá made every effort to purchase the cards, yet never the candy, I begrudgingly passed them out. I wasn’t a fool though, I never turned down the candy given to me and hardly ever read the cards.
So, I went down that ever-enticing Google rabbit hole and began a search for the history and significance of Valentine’s Day. As a Catholic, I started with a search on San Valentín…
