Dear Cupid,

My apologies but someone has to say it: you are over-rated. You and your Valentine’s Day commercialism and advertising and sitcom episodes and first-impression rose and your arrows and your chubby cheeks; it’s all too much. And it urges many of us to long for those we don’t yet know and some of us long for those we’ve known and lost. Essentially, you make many of us yearn for what we don’t have. That’s just sad.

No offense. My intent is not to be grumpy nor disgruntled. Or old. Or whatever. And if you’re thinking I just need one of your arrows right between the eyes that won’t work on me because most of the time I’m already in love. It’s just that life has taught me there are so many more interesting ways to define and express love. Despite this though, people still wait for you to shoot at them. Weird. Sometimes it’s almost like if love were the neighbourhood well, I wonder why oh why are so many people dying of thirst? (Drink the water people. Drink it.)

Because truth be told aren’t there definitions and declarations of love all around us every day if we choose to notice and choose to appreciate and choose to act on them in big and small ways? John Burroughs said it so well, “I still find each day too short for all the thoughts I want to think, all the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.” You see, every day itself is an expression of love. Even Mondays. (Well some of them.) We just have to want it: we must want what we already have. It’s as simple as that and as hard as that too. All those healthy things in your life: want them.

And this is why I think love is much more than chocolates and flowers and grocery store teddy-bears and a cherub with erratic aim. Love is February 15^th. And the 16^th and it’s November 8^th too. Sure love is still sometimes giddy with a crush but mostly it’s just a hand to hold or someone’s soft breathing or a group of people laughing while the potatoes are passed across the table or the tail wagging at the door or getting the kind of grapes you know she prefers or it’s an unexpected text or words of encouragement at work or an unexpected compliment (given or received) or a truly good belly-laugh. It’s guys’ night. It’s girls’ night. It’s play-dates. It’s a high five. And love is especially a new baby girl.

This is why, cherub, we don’t really need you. So grow up and get a real job. And a hobby. And hang with your friends. And eat chocolate chips. And choose to love it all.