Gift Giving Guy

It’s Sweetest Day, and my wife and I enjoyed coffee and Godiva chocolate biscuits on the sofa this morning.

Yesterday, I visited the downtown mall for my chocolate shopping, and I had lunch at the food court. While waiting in line for quesadillas, I ran into a co-worker. She was surprised to find me at the mall for lunch. I held up my shopping bag, and I said I was getting a Sweetest Day gift for my wife.

“Oh, my husband doesn’t do Sweetest Day,” she said. “He thinks it’s a commercial holiday.”

I smiled and said, “It’s a Midwestern tradition.”

But her husband does have a point about the commercial nature of Sweetest Day. The holiday came from the early 1920s. Cleveland, Ohio confectioners distributed more than 20,000 boxes of free candy to orphans and shut-ins. The giveaway was part an effort to inspire sweethearts to exchange candy presents and, in turn, boost candy sales.

Hallmark started making Sweetest Day cards in the mid-1960s, and this year has 163 greeting cards to choose from. So it’s easy to chalk up the day as one of those “Hallmark holidays,” invented primarily for commercial purposes.

But you can also choose view the day as another opportunity to express your love. You could give chocolates, flowers or a card. Or you could make an extra effort to show your love: kind words, a few more kisses, a good massage. I think of Sweetest Day as a ritual and a reminder to cherish the one I love.