This afternoon, when he was home from school, Charlie and I went through Charlie’s Valentine”s Day Box, which is, you know, just an old shoe box that’s been covered in Valentine’s Day decorations – and if you’re Charlie, the decorations are a mishmash mess, even though he’s the artist – and it looks like maybe he spent a total of four minutes on the whole box decoration project. Together, Charlie and I read every single Valentine’s Day card he received aloud to each other. He said the ones from his posse and his teacher were his favorites and he set them aside, showing those “best” cards to me last.

At the end of the valentine viewing, he said to me, “What have we learned from this time together?”

“That you’re well loved by many?” I answered…with another question.

“No,” he said. “All these Valentine’s Day cards that I GOT were accompanied by candy. By candy. The cards WE BOUGHT and I GAVE to all my friends had pencils. That’s lame…to give pencils instead of candy. I told you it was lame when we bought those at CVS, didn’t I?”

“You did,” I said. “I’m sorry, but by the looks of it, everyone got enough candy anyway.”

“I guess. It’s a bad impression, though. Pencils are nerdy. Candy is cool. I look like a real pencil nerd now.”

“I don’t think that’s possible, Charlie. I think most people think you’re pretty cool.”

“Of course a mother is going to say that. I’m telling you, it will take a lot of extra work now for me to overcome the Pencil Valentine’s Day cards. Maybe, if I’m lucky, I’ll have my Legendary Status back by the last day of school.”

“Let’s hope so. Anything I can do to help?”

“No. I don’t think so. You’ve done quite enough already,” Charlie said with a sigh and an eye roll.

Then I gave that fresh little boy a big Valentine’s Day kiss on the cheek, which he tried to wipe off.

Happy Lame Valentine’s Day!