February 14 - 17, 2014 (Part 1)

After 16 months of living apart and experiencing the highs and lows of a long-distance relationship, my husband moved home on February 14, 2013. It's a year later and Valentine’s Day just came and went again, so I guess it’s fair to say that we are no longer considered official newlyweds, (though I personally think our behavior suggests otherwise), as we’ve now lived together for over one year and one day.  I’ve never really been a big Valentine’s Day celebrator. Perhaps the classroom exchange of cards wasn’t for me, or it was more fun to go to Havasu with my dad for Winter Blast. Either way, until 2013 I didn’t think much of the middle of February. This year I appreciated every minute of Valentine’s Day and was thankful it started off on the Friday of a  long weekend. Both of our offices were closed Monday for President’s Day, and our weekend calendar was full of fun plans.

 

I didn’t send out a lot of cards this year, only 3 actually. I did manage to hand-deliver some bouquets and flower plants, which probably made me happier than it did the surprised recipients. I enjoyed thinking of people who would be unsuspecting of the gesture, and even included a friend whom I’ve never met. I didn’t want to freak her out and show up at her office without warning, but since she’s literally in the building across the street, I left her flowers with their lovely front desk receptionist. So we’ve actually still never met in person. But I don’t think a face-to-face handshake is what makes a friendship official.

 

Since my husband’s office and mine are an hour apart, lunch was out of the question. I instead lunched with my friend Emily, who showed up in tears and about 15 minutes late. I had already planned a long lunch on my work calendar so I wasn’t stressed about getting back on time, and I was able to listen to and catch up with a good friend over some overdue garlic fries.  She told me about her bad day at work and then we had some time for the usual gossip and such. Service was a nightmare but I wrote a very long and sincere letter to the owner detailing our experience when I got home that night, and it looks like another lunch with my friend will be calendared soon, on the house!

Finally the work day was done and it was home to see hubby. He had given me my Valentine’s presents two days early. A jar of spicy pickles and a beautiful hair clip, which I lost in less than 24 hours. He received nothing from me. But we spent the evening together preparing lobster and veggies for the BBQ. It was a lot of fun and a delicious reward to our long days at work.  We crawled into bed much earlier than usual because our Saturday was going to be starting very early and we needed all of our energy! And because, well, you know… it was Valentine's Day. xoxo

 

 

I treated Saturday much like any regular Monday through Friday and tried to ignore my alarm for as long as possible. We were getting out of bed even earlier than usual to go volunteer with the Walnut Creek Open Space Foundation. Having worked with this group before, I knew what a labor-intensive 3 hours we were about to participate in.

We worked hard with the group trekking up and down Shell Ridge Open Space in Walnut Creek.  We helped maintain the lives of little oak trees for our three hours, and were set free at noon. 

Breakfast at TJ's Café in Martinez immediately followed. We had worked up quite an appetite and had an errand to run, so it was a convenient stop. I enjoyed a veggie patty with my eggs and left the place feeling pretty healthy. Another couple that we are friends with lives just up the street, so we delivered a day-late gift of vegan chocolates from Café Leonidas in Walnut Creek. We were still too wet and dirty to spend any time at their home, so we left after a few air hugs and rushed home to the showers.

 

Big plans had been made for our Saturday night! We unfortunately had to cancel seeing our friend's band (Durt Cheap) play at E.J. Phair's in Concord. But for good reason! My husband's cousin, Christopher Bengochea was the lead tenor for Madama Butterfly, on their opening night at the California Theatre in San Jose.  After fancying up, we drove south for an hour and arrived at the beautiful opera house!

 

 

 

 

I had no idea the storyline of the play until it was over. It was so beautifully sung with flawless execution of the soundtrack in the background. The interior setting was gorgeous and the theatre was a lot of fun to be in.  We had amazing seats and a digital screen above us translated the songs. It was the best opera I've been to yet, and so much more special knowing the star of the show! After the tear-jerking, brilliant performance, we joined our cousin and some of his friends for a drink and appetizers at Original Joe's Restaurant, around the corner from the opera house.  It was midnight by this time and we had a long drive, after our long day, so we didn't have a lot of energy left. After a few olives and one Bud Light, we were ready to hit the road. Hugs and kisses to our cousin with many thanks for our tickets to his show, and an hour later, Saturday was behind us as we fell quickly asleep in bed.

 

Long weekend, half over...