Yes, it’s Valentine’s Day…
and yes, this post should probably contain some kind of wispy, ethereal wedding snap, a ‘first-date-throwback’ or, if the current trend is anything to go by, a love-note-to-self wrapped up for public consumption.
All of the above - however inspiring and useful they may sometimes be - somehow this year (for me, at least!) creaked of insincerity.
So…instead, I’m using the V-day sentiment to pay tribute to THE teen tv series that is almost solely responsible, for introducing the class of 99’ to the reality (and sometimes torture) of that head-over-heels feeling we like to call L.O.V.E.
As a push pin for when love hearts scribbled on the back of your notebook became ‘a thing’ – My So Called Life is probably etched on the memory of every teenage girl who, after watching, could never quite see the school boiler room the same way again.
If you haven’t ever seen ‘My So Called Life’, then firstly… you’ve missed out.
Secondly, much of the ramblings in this post probably won’t make much sense!
By all accounts, it takes having witnessed Clare Danes and Jared Letto single-handedly squash the pre-teen boy-meets-girl dream - to understand why the series holds such significance, twenty plus years later!
For all its seeming irrelevance to adult life - not to mention those face palm moments of teenage angst - this programme DOES highlight one important truth!
That is, that LOVE is not nearly as clean cut, loud or visual as the heart-shaped gestures that have come to definite it, would often imply.
Quite to the contrary, ‘love’ so often creeps in undetected, and thrives not in the limelight, but in the privacy and comfort of its very own beating boiler room.
Love, in this way, is not always romantic, dear-diary-worthy or butterfly-sparking, but none of this makes its existence any less so!
On this ‘so-called’ day of love, this is perhaps reason enough to go rogue on the social media standard, and reject the overwhelming pressure to embrace our inner-cheeseball…publicly, at least, even if not in private! 🧀
🎥 @giphy