Single Girls Gist: My Best Valentine’s Day Experience,

                                          My Best Valentine’s Day Experience,

                                           Let’s Make This One Count!

Hi dear, its Valentine’s day in two days’ time and this one, I am particularly excited about because I am switching things up a little. I am tired of waiting for a guy to whisk me to some romantic island to celebrate this day or gift me something that will leave me speechless, so this time around, I would like to make some ladies day special.

Before I get into my plans for my single ladies, let me share my Best Valentine’s day experience with you. This is not one of those posts where I hide behind the curtains of a fiction story, No. It is my experience and one that I am proud to have had and do not mind sharing with you. If my story resonates with you, please do not hesitate to say so in the comment section below.

There are rules to this post – Do not judge me, so you will not be judged (I hope that is bribe enough *lol*), listen to the points and pick out lessons from it. If you are a regular reader of my posts, you already know the need for these rules but if this is your first time reading my blog, you are about to have an interesting ride.

A little background will be apt. Love has

not been something I cared about, in fact, I used to run away from love. I lost the first love of my life to death at a tender age of 17 (that’s a story for another day) and this unfortunate experience left me with two strong but weird beliefs.

Firstly, no one stays in your life forever so don’t waste valuable time building love or a future with someone who will leave you at the end of the day and secondly, I only date people who, if they walked out of my life, I won’t hurt at all but only move to the next available person.

I cannot categorically say that these beliefs were bad or good but what I can say is that they helped me escape heart breaks in my University days. Now, to my best Val’s day experience.

At the age of 22, I had broken up with my boyfriend and moved to date this guy, let’s call him Tony. I met Tony on the same day he was relocating from Lagos to Ekiti state. This, in every sense, should have been my cue to take off because, how could I be meeting my boyfriend the same day he was leaving the city I was in to another city, five hours drive away from me? But, I thought, the farther he was, the less attached I would be to him, so I plunged in.

Now Tony was one of those guys who grew up with a low self-esteem. He never thought himself fine enough or good enough to get any girl he wanted so he hid behind the shades of focusing on his books and not having time for love. He was of the opinion that if he became successful, he would be able to get any girl he wanted and successful he became.

When we met, he was kind enough to tell his truth. He said I was his first ever girlfriend and he was happy to begin to experience love with me (if only he knew that I was work in progress myself.). He also said that the closest to a girlfriend he had had was a very pretty lady who used to live in his estate, in Lagos. He had just started working for the multinational company where he was now a departmental head and used to visit her every day, on his way back from work.

He was never open with her about the way he felt because he thought that his presence and the unending gifts he bought her, every time he went visiting, was enough proof that he liked her and wanted to be with her.

On this faithful day, as usual, he had gone to her apartment after work to spend time with his delusional girlfriend, only that, there was nothing usual about this day. There was a man in her house whom she introduced as her boyfriend, she then told the man that Tony was the guy who was always kind enough to get her dinner, every day. This hurt Tony deeply and he vowed never to visit her again.

This story made no sense to me because I could not understand why he did not just tell her exactly how he felt but that was his past and it was evident that he was dealing with himself so making my opinion known to him would have been like putting a knife into an already deep wound.  

Tony really had no experience with love whatsoever. Whenever he visited me in Lagos, he would spend the whole day with his friend at the bar, return home drunk to stupor and pass out almost immediately and continue the cycle the next day. He didn’t understand why his girlfriend would call him at 3pm just to hear his voice. According to him, if it wasn’t an important conversation, something that had to do with the growth of the economy maybe, we should not be having the conversation at that time. And later in the evening, when he called, I dare not discuss my experience at work with him because that was boring conversation. I still remember the way my heart twisted when he said,

‘That is the reason I do not call you often because when I pick up my phone to call you, I already know that you will start telling me your ‘bullshit’ work talks.’

I didn’t know how we got here. Our relationship started beautifully at the early stage of it. He would call me for close to an hour every day and we would go on and on about our day until we both had nothing else to say. And barely 2 months into it, I was getting this.

I didn’t know what he wanted to hear or what really interested him so I stopped talking when he called and just added ‘hmmms and oh really’s’ to whatever he said until he ended the call. 

I was not happy in the relationship but that was what I had at the time and if I am being truthful, the money he sent to me immediately I raised any financial issue, made my stay in the relationship longer than it should have been, until this particular Valentine’s day.

A week to the day, I had asked that I came over to his place in Ekiti for the weekend. I mean, Valentine’s day was on a Saturday so arriving my boyfriend’s place on Friday evening and leaving on Sunday evening for Lagos was the reasonable thing to do, or so I thought.

I had brought up going over to see him in the past but he would rather come to Lagos to spend time with me and his friends, mostly his friends, than have me come over. But this time was different. He was excited about my coming until Thursday evening.

He called me to give one flimsy excuse as to why I could not come over and how he was too busy to come to Lagos. Somewhere in my heart, I thought that was his plan to pay me a surprise visit on Saturday so I agreed and told him that we had other Valentine’s day to spend together.

Saturday morning, I waited for his surprise call or his knock on my door but none of this happened and so I called him. He sounded too relaxed to be on his way to Lagos. At this point, I could not take it any longer. I asked what his plans were for the day and if a surprise visit to my house was part of it. He laughed me to stupidity and said,

“I thought we had spoken about this already. I am not coming over. I have been here, lazing up in bed, trying to talk myself into going to the kitchen to prepare food to eat.”

I could not believe my ears; he really was not coming over! My eyes were wet and my voice was starting to fail me so I made up something to get off the phone and he obliged without any hesitation.

‘What am I into? What is this I call a relationship?’ I thought to myself as tears freely flowed down my cheeks. ‘I should leave this relationship already but how will it be said that I broke up with my boyfriend because of a mare Valentine’s day?

I went on and on, crying and questioning my stand until I heard my phone ring. I thought it was him calling to tell me how he had succeeded in pulling my legs and that he was standing in front of my door.

So I ran to the sitting room, where my phone was charging, to pick it up only to be taken aback by the name I saw on my screen. It was my ex. Let’s call him Sam.

‘Why is Sam calling me I thought to myself as I picked up the call and said with disgust,

“Hello, Sam.”

“Hi Omy, how have you been? Happy Valentine’s day.”

“At least someone is happy about today,” I mumbled then said, “fine. You?”

“I am doing good. I fought myself not to make this call but I will not gain anything if I did not make it, so here I am. What are you doing today?”

“Nothing,” I replied, wondering if he was calling to mock me.

“Oh great, I am going on a boat cruise with a friend of mine and his girlfriend and I was wondering if you would like to join me.”

WHAT! Sam was inviting me to spend Valentine’s day with him!

“Oh yeah, I sincerely will not mind. When should I come over?”

“Now please. We are already at Ikoyi boat club and I asked them to give me a minute to try my luck.”

“That’s crazy because it would take me almost an hour to get to Ikoyi from Ajah.”

“Yes, I know, I will wait for you if you are willing to come.”

I am sure you already know what my response was….?

“YES!” I’d just get dressed and head over there.” I almost screamed.

“That will lovely, I cannot wait to see you again.” Sam responded with excitement stained all over his voice and ended the call.

‘Oh my Lord, Yes! I will not be alone today. I am going have fun today.’ I chanted as I got ready for my date.

On my way out, my phone rang again. As I searched my busy bag for it, wondering if Sam really could not wait to see me this much that he was calling again. Just that it was not Sam, it was Tony. I stared at the phone for the longest, wondering if I should up the call or not. I picked it up and I heard him say,

‘Why did it take you long to pick? Are you still angry with me? I told you I would be busy today now and I thought you understood.”

“Angry? Certainly not. I was just busy getting ready to go hangout with my friends.”

“Haa, is it not funny that on Valentine’s day, I am in the kitchen cooking by myself and my girlfriend is going out with her friends?” Tony said.

“You know what, they have been waiting for me for a while now, let me call you back when I get there, so I do not keep them waiting any longer.” I said and hurriedly ended the call before he could say another word and off I went to Ikoyi club to have the boat cruise of a life time.

You see, sometimes, bad things happen in our lives to give us the chance for good things to happen. If you will like to know what later happened with me and Sam and Tony, tell me in the comment section and I will put out a second part.

Now, to my single ladies. Do not put yourself under any pressure. If you do not have a date this Valentine’s day, in my little way, I will like to make it less saddening for you. I will be taking four of you out on a movie date this Valentine’s day. You have to be in Lagos and be able to come to the Island. If you are interested, please go to my Instagram page and comment on my last post. You should add the fact that you are from my blog and that will make you more eligible to be picked. I hope this puts a smile on your face and please come camera ready because we are going to take a lot of pictures.

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY MY LOVE AND REMEMBER, WE ARE SINGLE AND NOT DEAD; LIFE MUST GO ON. ABI MUSTN’T IT?

XOXO

……….Talk2urHommie……….