A Household Word
Love Child

It’s February and any day now my son will come home from school with a list of his classmates’ names. The list is for Valentine’s Day. There are 23 kids in Lewis’ fourth-grade class and he will need to have a card for each child – even the girls.

When I was a kid, how many valentines you got was an accurate reflection of how popular you were. It wasn’t a holiday for wimps and it wasn’t politically correct. Now, every kid sends a card to every other kid. The girls also send cards to the teacher, the student teacher, the crossing guard, the school bus driver, the school nurse, the principal and the lunch ladies.

I have no problem with the sentiment. The problem is that my son would rather do anything – play on the computer, eat creamed spinach, even clean his room – before he would put a pen to paper. Especially to send valentines. Especially to girls, who are gross.

So writing out the cards becomes a struggle. Me nagging. Him postponing and making excuses. It could take weeks to write out 23 valentines for the children in his class (never mind the ones for the principal and the nurse). It almost makes homeschooling seem appealing. Almost. Maybe military academy. I bet the cadets don’t have to send valentines to their sergeants.

I know that there’s probably an upside to having to write out 23 valentines. For one thing, it will give him fodder for future psychotherapy sessions.

He’ll also get a chance to practice his cursive and maybe develop his math skills: “If there are 24 valentines in a box and Lewis messes up 16 envelopes, how many envelopes will his mother have to make out of notebook paper?”