11 Things That Got Me Through The Most Difficult Valentine's Day Of My Life

If you're reading this right now because you were hoping to enjoy a nice uplifting tale about the tactics one brave, heartbroken man used to get through the first Valentine's Day following the untimely -- not to mention gruesome -- death of his wife and soul mate, well, I'm afraid you'll be terribly disappointed with this post. I'm sorry to have deceived you, but it's good to know that sentimental click-bait headlines do work as advertised.

My first Valentine's Day as a married man was supposed to be spent telling tasteless jokes like these to a bunch of strangers at a sold out fundraiser event. Unfortunately, weather concerns led to the event being canceled. That left me with a choice. I could either:

• A.) scramble to pick up another spot at a comedy club to fill my insatiable need for approval and acceptance from people I probably wouldn't like if I got to know them, or
•  B.) put together a romantic dinner to surprise the wife who was expecting to come home to an empty house after a 12-hour shift caring for burn victims.

I chose the latter.

For dinner, I prepared a lemon-seasoned chicken breast topped with a caramelized onions, Monterey Jack cheese and strips of greasy bacon; tomato basil couscous; and a huge Caesar salad. This sounds like a good husband adjusting extremely well to his newly married life, right? On the surface, I guess that's true. But in between preparing an artery-clogging masterpiece for my own true love, I was furiously firing off break-up texts to random phone numbers.

The White Knight

 I hit a home run with the first random text I put out there. Not only did this righteous man respond to my ridiculous message, he -- or possibly she, but I think it's a he -- also felt compelled to engage in a conversation and criticize my actions.

 

  

'Good luck with whatever your going through'

Of course, not all of my random texts were successful. I probably sent more than a dozen messages without getting any type of a response from the random number. Many of these messages were the "I hate to do this is this way but ..." intro that got the white knight to bite. But I did try a few variations, such as:

• I just can't do this any more ... I can't pretend that everything is ok just because it's fuckin Valentine's Day.
• Happy Valentine's Day baby! Guess what I know all about Steven the Twink! So you can just cut the shit about working late. I'm gonna make your life miserable you lying piece of shit.
• Happy Valentine's Day ... It's not your baby! How does that feel you lying piece of shit!?

And here are some of the other brief interactions I had with random numbers:

Me: I hate to do this in this way but I think we both know this is going nowhere. It's over ... I'll cancel the reservations. I hope you didn't get me anything, cause I didn't ...
Random Number (RN): What
Me: Please don't make this difficult ... Neither of us has been faithful
RN: I think you have the wrong number ...
Me: Oh Jesus Christ ... I'm so sorry I knew I should've just called her
Me: Hope you're having a better Valentine's Day than me.
RN: No problem ... Good luck with whatever you're going through
Me: Thanks man! I gotta stop dating hos and find a girl I can introduce to my mom

CONVERSATION ENDS

Me: I hate to do this in this way but I think we both know this is going nowhere. It's over ... I'll cancel the reservations. I hope you didn't get me anything, cause I didn't ...
Random Number (RN): Who is this?
RN: ??
Me: Please just be an adult ... Neither of us have been faithful
RN: Listen I think you have the wrong number
Me: Wait ... shit!
RN: Yeah .....
Me: So sorry ... I took some MDMA happy valentine's to me
RN: K
Me: Hope you had a better day than me bro ... My fucking arm is numb

CONVERSATION ENDS 

Me: I hate to do this in this way but I think we both know this is going nowhere. It's over ... I'll cancel the reservations. I hope you didn't get me anything, cause I didn't ...
Random Number (RN): Who is this?

Me: What?

Me: You mean that philosophically ... Like who is this person?

CONVERSATION ENDS