Digressions: My Life in 500 Words or Less

Thursday is Valentine’s Day, and that means eating homemade pizza and drinking pink champagne while relaxing on a picnic blanket.

I’ve written before about this tradition Rebecca and I have. We celebrate the day by recreating our first Valentine’s Day together 33 years ago.

Yep. On our first Valentine’s Day, Rebecca baked homemade pizza, and we drank pink champagne as we ate it. We had the meal picnic-style, sitting on a checkered blanket while we watched a movie.

There’s something to be said for tradition.

Sure, it has been said “consistency is the hallmark of the unimaginative” and “a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds,” but it also has been said consistency is the “true foundation of trust.” And traditions, though they tend to be consistent, are not what I would describe as foolish or unimaginative.

While traditions, which tend to be consistent, might not be a foundation of trust, they can be great comforts.

Traditions are like memories. They are moments captured and recreated.

And this one has homemade pizza and champagne. Far be it from me to say no!

I know we’re not the only couple with a Valentine’s Day tradition. Doubtlessly, celebrations on levels up and down the spectrum occur each Feb. 14.

Yeah, I realize some might not even celebrate the day. It is, after all, viewed by some as an over-commercialized spontaneity-lacking celebration of an emotion that should not be bound by the confines of a 24-hour time limit. I’m also aware that some don’t celebrate the day because they don’t feel they need to be told when to express their love.

That’s all well and good. For others.

Celebrating Valentine’s Day has become a special tradition in this home. It’s more than a day of candy, cards and canoodling.

It has homemade pizza and champagne!

Though the candy, cards and canoodling are welcome, we are more interested in keeping alive a time-worn tradition that makes me remember the beginning of our relationship.

Over the years, some things have changed about champagne labeling, including the original type we bought, making it a challenge to find what we want. But we try to get as close to our original celebration as possible, sometimes settling for substitutes.

But celebrating this day doesn’t mean Rebecca and I don’t have other romantic dinners. It doesn’t mean we think we are not truly a couple if we don’t celebrate the day.

It just means we are commemorating a day we celebrated together more than three decades ago.

What makes me smile is that it hasn’t gotten old. I still look forward to celebrating our Valentine’s Day tradition each year.

There’s something to be said for tradition.

Besides, there’s going to be homemade pizza and champagne.