Careful in the Valentine’s Day Aisle

I don’t know about the rest of you, but one of my friends and I ran into a similar problem. He reported via Facebook:

Hey Walgreens, how about if when someone searches your site for ‘Valentine’ you try to separate the cute puppy valentine cards from the condoms and love lotions. You know, for the children. Or more specifically, for the parents of the children who are doing the search.

Excellent.

This year, sweet little J was super-excited to get Valentine’s Day gifts for the family. In fact, she wanted to start shopping way back in January. The other day I took her to CVS, and she brought her orange-and-yellow duct tape purse full of money. I surveyed the various lotions and shampoos in another aisle to give her privacy, just in case she wanted to buy something for me. Then she walked up to the cashier and bought her choices all by herself. She was so excited and proud!

Once we got home, she couldn’t resist showing me what she’d picked out for M and Cute W. Like this:

Ah, Lucky Lovers’ Dice. The perfect gift from an 8-year-old to her Dad. Bless her heart, it all sounds pretty good to her. We hug on the couch all the time. What was I supposed to do? I told her that she’d chosen fabulous gifts.

Cut to Valentine’s Day Eve, when we exchanged gifts. Cute W opened his gift and smiled, uncomfortable. He was baffled. “Umm, thank you. Is this supposed to be for Mommy and me?” he asked. “It’s for anyone!” was my bright and pointed reply. “For example, we hug on the couch all the time!” Cute W and I have smiles pasted on our face, and then we can’t help but laugh. “That is a pretty hilarious gift,” M said. She sensed that it was inappropriate, if not exactly how it was inappropriate. “Isn’t it awesome?” I replied. “J picked out all the gifts all by herself!”

Now we were all laughing, but it wasn’t the uncomfortable-and-icky laugh of receiving a slightly creepy gift. J was so proud, and luckily M was gracious. Cute W and I couldn’t help laughing, but it worked, because the girls were happy and laughing with joy, anyway. It was pure nuttiness with just a dash of Christmas morning.

We all played the new game Cute W had brought home, and then he had to rush off to soccer.

The game broke up after a bit of cheating, and M ran over to the dining table, covered with tissue paper and chocolates.

“Oh, oh, I know!” M called out. “Let’s play with the dice! . . . Okay, let’s go wrestle in the bathtub!”