The day which shall not be named...

It's not a coincidence that "Valentine's Day" and "Voldemort" both start with the letter "V". It seems they're both words that must not be spoken aloud in certain company (or written in txt...this is 2009 and no one actually uses verbal communication anymore).

I recently began dating someone. We met a few weeks ago and had a great conversation, text at least every few days, and have been on one great date with mention of wanting to see each other again. That was a week ago today. And though we exchanged texts Thursday and Friday night leading up to this dreaded day, plans for the weekend have never been discussed. So here I lie in bed Saturday morning on Valentine's Day preparing to run errands and buy my ceremonious V-Day gallon-size bottle of Arbor Mist, but wondering whether I should be straightforward and ask this guy what his plans are for the weekend. Meaning tonight. Meaning Valentine's Day. But as much as the "V word" is of course implied, for me to come right out and say (well...text) "do you wanna go out for Valentine's Day?" seems so taboo two weeks in. It screams "be my Valentine and let's and fall in love and get married on top of a mountain and have millions of babies and forever tell the story about how we fell in love on the most romantic day of the year!"

Yet assuming this relationship is on a progressive path, what are we supposed to do, cross this weekend off the calendar, skip it, not see each other, and pick up where we left off next week? All with an unspoken and unmentionable agreement that spending Valentine's Day together was just too much too soon, so the day didn't exist. And if it does work out in the long run, look back and know that even though we had already begun dating, we weren't special enough to spend V-Day together? But a second date on Valentine's Day is a whole helluva lot of pressure. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

So for fear of getting "avada kedavra"-ed in love, I plan to keep the "V word" out of my mouth today.