The significance of Valentine’s Day varies with one’s stage of life.
In elementary and middle school, it was all about mailing Valentines to classmates in a box with a slit on the top and hoping to get at least one signed “Guess who?” or from somebody I secretly liked. In high school, I tried to ignore the fact that I didn’t have anybody sending me a serious Valentine or asking me out and just savoured the solid chocolate heart Mum would give me at breakfast on February 14th.
Adult feelings
In university, V-Day became worth celebrating when I’d fallen in love. A carefully planned dinner date would make my heart sing. When married with children, I loved opening a heartfelt card and arranging a babysitter for our rare dinner out at a fancy restaurant.
On the first Valentine’s Day after my separation, a couple kindly included me in their dinner out. My heartache eliminated any celebration of romantic love and made swallowing food a challenge. On a subsequent Valentine’s Day, when single and dating, the man-of-the-moment appeared with a bouquet of long-stemmed red roses. What a cliché! He thought he was romancing me; I soon realized that he wasn’t worth my time. And he turned out to be married!
The following year I was still single but dating a formerly platonic widowed friend - experimenting to see if we shared romantic feelings. Knowing I would be in New Zealand on a group tour on February 14th, he gave me money “to buy yourself something special on Valentine’s Day.” Dining at a winery, I purchased a stylish black apron, embroidered with its name in gold. Despite his generosity, the relationship fizzled after I got home.
For me, Valentine’s Day finally lived up to its hype again in 2013. I’d fallen in love and would later remarry. The first card my new lover gave me is tucked away in my memento box.
This year’s observance sparked reminiscence of those romantically fallow years when all those red hearts and flowers in store displays and “Special Valentine’s Dinner” notices turned me right off. “Those of us without love partners are overwhelmed,” I’d grumble to myself. “Enough already with the commercialism!”
And yet, it was crucial for me go through those single, lonely holidays.
The Neutral Zone
In 2022, I co-authored a book with divorce lawyer David Frenkel, My Divorce Journal: A Guided Path to Moving Forward[1]. We include William Bridges’ transition model: Endings, The Neutral Zone, New Beginnings.[2]
“Picture yourself sitting in a rowboat crossing a lake, travelling from a rocky shoreline (Endings), across the water (The Neutral Zone), to a beautiful, verdant island (New Beginnings) with sandy beach and lovely mountains.
Sitting in a wobbly rowboat in the middle of the water may seem like a silly thing to do. Should we hurry up and row with purpose to reach the opposite shore? For some, the answer is no. Would you benefit from valuing the gap between Endings and New Beginnings and not being in a hurry to close it? You may ultimately be better off if you keep still and float for a while in the middle. This may be a good place to regroup.
One activity you can do in the Neutral Zone is truly surrender to the new emptiness in your life and appreciate the pause. Perhaps you’ve been afraid to accept this new, temporary reality and haven’t lived the feelings that emanate from this state.
Bridges says there are three main reasons for the emptiness between the old life and the new:
First, the process of transformation is essentially a death and rebirth process rather than one of mechanical modification …
The second reason for the gap between the old life and the new is that the process of disintegration and reintegration is the source of renewal … The neutral zone is the only source of the self-renewal that we all seek. We need it, just the way that an apple tree needs the cold of winter.
The last reason for the emptiness … is the perspective it provides on the stages themselves.”[3]
So, that’s where I was between those celebratory Valentine’s Days of my first marriage and lovely Valentine’s Days with my later-life-love. I was drifting in The Neutral Zone. It has paid off in spades.
I wish anyone currently drifting in The Neutral Zone wisdom and patience. You are living a crucial experience. Don’t rush it.
[1] David Frenkel & Pat Butler, My Divorce Journal: A Guided Path to Moving Forward (Toronto, ON: Frenkel Tobin Publications, 2022)
[2] William Bridges, Transitions: Making Sense of Life’s Changes (Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 2019)
[3] David Frenkel & Pat Butler, My Divorce Journal: A Guided Path to Moving Forward (Toronto, ON: Frenkel Tobin Publications, 2022), 122.