Then, One Drunken Valentine's Night...by Vonnie Davis

After my divorce in the early nineties, I spent twelve years as a single woman. As such, I have to tell you, I hated Valentine’s Day. It was a day for couples, displays of affection, flowers and wining and dining. In contrast, I was stuck in the “world of aloneness” with a pack of Oreos, take-out Chinese and the company of two cats—who were getting more snuggle time than I was, I might add.

Twelve years is a long time to yearn to belong to someone. Perhaps that’s why I enjoy writing romance. Don’t we all long to belong? We place two characters on the page and watch them dance around each other, sometimes in a foxtrot, occasionally in a pelvic-grinding slow dance and often in the sensual push and pull of a tango. The music stops and tensions and conflicts arise. One misstep and hearts are broken.

Now we all know a broken heart doesn’t mend overnight. It took me eleven years to reach the point where I wanted to give love a chance again. And what did I do? I drank too much wine one Valentine’s eve, went online and filled out a membership form for match dot com. Really, at fifty-three you’d think I’d have had more sense. But I was in the middle of a righteous, wine-induced crying jag and, like Rhett Butler, frankly I didn’t give a wine-darn.

I did the next morning, though, when I sat straight up in the bed, clasping my ears so they wouldn’t fall off my hung-over head and gasped, “My God, I put myself on the Internet. A picture and everything!” I threw back the covers and scrambled out of bed, determined to delete my match dot com profile aptly titled “Magnet 4 the Absurd.” I cracked my knuckles as I waited for my old dial-up connection to whiz and whirl as it did its thing. After all, I reasoned, I was a grandma and an “extra-fluffy” one at that (polite-speak for overweight). How many guys would possibly respond?

I had seventeen emails in less than eight hours. Some were stinkers. A few were looking for a sugar momma to support them. And a couple, I suspect, were married, in search of a little action on the side. Then, there was Calvin. A retired English teacher who also wrote. It was this man who healed my broken heart.

My Valentine’s Days are no longer alone. We don’t do extravagant celebrations. Dinner out sometimes. Perhaps an afternoon movie. I might get a pot of pink tulips—my favorite. Mainly, I get lots of hugs—and Calvin gives the best hugs.

However you celebrate Valentine’s, why not stop by some of the Roses’ blogs for the Honky Tonk Hearts Blog Hop? Some of us, along with many other authors, wrote novellas in the Honky Tonk Hearts series at The Wild Rose Press. We're all coming together with our stories to show you how lonely hearts come together in Texas, in Gus Rankin's Lonesome Steer Honky Tonk.

Leave a comment; there will be lots of prizes. The blog hop runs from tomorrow, the 13^th to the 15^th. You can start at my blog— www.vintagevonnie.blogspot.com –where you’ll find the list of links to other participating blogs.

Visit Vonnie Davis at www.vonniedavis.com