A Love Well Spent
When it comes to Valentine’s Day, thoughts of romance, chocolate, hearts, and a special time with a special someone usually come to mind. It’s a reminder to do loving things for the people closest to us, to spend our love in gifts or time for the other.
However, for some, “Valentine’s Day” stabs a scabbed and empty part of their hearts. It reminds them that their loved one is no longer with them.
For a widow or a widower, this could be a very hard and not-so-romantic day. And for many, they sit in their loneliness, with nobody to even notice their hurting and vacant hearts.
Now St. Valentine, who Valentine’s Day is named after, was known as a priest—not exactly someone you’d initially think to name such a day after. But this man who loved God and others is said to have married couples while it was illegal to do so, under Christian persecution. The whole “Valentine’s Day card” is believed to have originated from a miracle that occurred right before he was beheaded: While imprisoned for refusing to deny Christ, he healed the jailor’s blind daughter. Upon the day of his execution—February 14th, believe it or not—he left a note for the girl signed “Your Valentine.” Thus, the tradition of a Valentine’s note.
This love that he showed, even for those who were imprisoning him, was not pointed inward to himself; his love was pointed outward, toward those hurting and in need of love.
Not to dismiss the importance of a romantic date with the one you love, or doing something special for the person closest to you, but maybe this little story can teach us to direct our love in a broader scope this Valentine’s, to be a day to remember those who are most sad, lonely, or without someone to love them.
The words of Rudyard Kipling in his poem “The Widower” prove insightful for what such a person may be experiencing:
For a season there must be pain--
For a little, little space
I shall lose the sight of her face,
Take back the old life again
While She is at rest in her place.
For a season this pain must endure,
For a little, little while
I shall sigh more often than smile
Till time shall work me a cure,
And the pitiful days beguile.
For that season we must be apart,
For a little length of years,
Till my life's last hour nears,
And, above the beat of my heart,
I hear Her voice in my ears.
But I shall not understand--
Being set on some later love,
Shall not know her for whom I strove,
Till she reach me forth her hand,
Saying, "Who but I have the right?"
And out of a troubled night
Shall draw me safe to the land.
Though his poem seems to point toward a future, second spouse, maybe we can be the “Who but I” for another in the manner of friendship, drawing the other out of their “troubled night.”
Will your love be “well spent” this year?
Windy Prairie Coffee is putting on a sale in honor of Valentine’s Day! There will be a 10% site-wide sale running from February 7th through February 15th, 2020. Use Code VD2020 at checkout!
As an idea to jump start your “love well spent,” enjoy Edith’s delicious Mocha Dessert recipe (see below) to make and share with that person lacking a Valentine. If you are looking for other gift ideas, we also now offer e-cards, along with our chocolate-covered coffee beans and freshly roasted coffee beans.
Yummy Mocha Dessert Recipe
2 ½ cups crispy chocolate cookies, crushed
¼ cup melted butter
¼ cup chopped pecans
16 oz. cream cheese
½ cup chocolate syrup
1 pint whipping cream (whipped)
1 ¼ – 1 ½ cups STRONG pour-over coffee
1 ½ – 2 cups powdered sugar, depending how sweet you want it
Mix together first three ingredients and press into 9x13 pan, saving a little for the top. Make pour over. Whip cream cheese till very smooth. In another bowl, whip cream; add vanilla and powdered sugar to taste. Slowly mix in the whipped cream to the cream cheese so that there are no lumps. Add the rest of the ingredients, mix together, and pour into pan. Add remaining cookie crumbs, and freeze.