Setting the Bar Too High?

I have to admit, I've been a very spoiled lady lately.   I've received flowers from my fiance no less than three times in the last month and a half.  Now before you go thinking that he did something wrong and was doing a "mea culpa", let me just say that he was not in trouble when these flowers arrived and, to the best of my knowledge, had not done anything wrong that required advanced heart softening before I found out.  I am just a very lucky girl whose in love with a very florally expressive man.  In other words, he likes to say it with flowers.

 

On Valentine's Day, these were delivered to my work by the local florist via van
and delivered to my classroom by the school secretary on foot.

I once wrote in a blog, back in my single days, that I was a little jealous of all the girls at work who got flowers delivered on Valentine's Day.  My honey took that little tidbit of information and tucked it away in his steel trap of a brain for safe keeping until last month.  On Valentine's Day, in the middle of math class, my instruction was interrupted by a knock on the door.  The knock was immediately followed by the school secretary entering with a vase full of roses and carnations.  She was all smiles as she handed me the flowers and told me that somebody must love me an awful lot.  My students were suitably impressed and oohed and ahhed while I read the card.  They also awwwed me as I finished reading with a huge smile on my face and a little tear in the corner of one eye. What can I say?  My honey is exceedingly good at expressing his mushy feelings both verbally and in writing.  Like I said, I'm a lucky girl.  It was a very pleasant, though not entirely unexpected surprise.

Throughout the day, friends and colleagues stopped by to see my flowers and tell me how beautiful they were.  I had conversations with two friends that day about getting Valentine's and flowers.  Both had been married for many years and smiled at my flowers while lamenting their lack of flowers.  The first friend told me that in the early years of her marriage, when her family's budget was tighter, she'd made the mistake of fussing at her husband for spending too much money on flowers one Valentine's Day.  He had taken that as a license to refrain from getting her flowers ever again and she's been kicking herself for the remark ever since.

The second friend, my church's choir director, e-mailed me asking me if I could show up early for choir practice later that night.  I'd teasingly replied that sure I could, it wasn't like I really needed to spend time with my fiance on Valentine's Day or anything.  She immediately apologized and told me she'd completely forgotten it was Valentine's Day.  I told her that if she didn't know it was Valentine's Day, then her husband needed to step up his game.  She laughed and then shared that since her husband had been in the Navy for twenty years and in the submarine service (and not home) for several of those years, they'd gotten in the habit of celebrating holidays and birthdays when it was convenient.  However, since he'd been retired from the Navy for many years now, she agreed that it might be time for him to start remembering Valentine's Day in a timely manner again.

These conversations got me wondering.  Do the flowers some day just stop?  When life gets busy with kids and carpools or work and travel does the romance go out of a relationship?  I sure hope not, but as I'm rather new in the land of love, how would I know?  But those were thoughts to ponder a few years down the road, if I needed to ponder them at all.  When I got home that night, my honey had a card, candy, and jewelry waiting for me.  He bought me a gorgeous amethyst necklace.  Romance didn't seem to be in any danger of disappearing from our lives any time soon.

The next round of flowers came just this last week as we celebrated the one year anniversary of our first date.  Can you believe it's been a year already?  The friend who introduced us couldn't believe it had only been a year.  He introduced us in September of 2011, but my honey was slightly slow moving in the game of love and didn't ask for my number until New Year's and then didn't ask me out until March.  Everything is meant to happen in its own time, I guess.  We unintentionally created a week-long anniversary celebration.  Last Sunday, I took my honey out for a fine dining anniversary lunch.  It was a little extravagant, but very romantic, and worth every penny in my opinion.  My honey had arranged to recreate our first date by getting us tickets to the Caps game, but as there was no game on our actual anniversary (Wednesday), we would be going the day after.  Then, Mother Nature decided to intervene, though we still aren't sure if she was intervening on our behalf or working against us. 

Monday morning, the local weathermen were calling for some snow on our anniversary.  We went to the store to stock up on a few perishables and called it good.  By Monday night, they were calling for accumulating snow.  Other than hoping D.C. had cleared the streets in time for us to drive in for the hockey game, we weren't worried.  By Tuesday, they were calling for up to a foot of snow on our anniversary and my honey nervously ran to the store for bread, milk, TP, and...flowers.

Are roses the new snowstorm essential?

Unbeknownst to me, my honey had arranged for flowers to be delivered to me at work on our anniversary.  But, with snow threatening to bury the region, the chances that I would be at school to receive them were looking slim to none.  So, he ran out the night before and grabbed a dozen roses at the supermarket.  He told me that he had to make sure I had flowers on our anniversary.  Isn't he sweet? 

On the morning of our anniversary, we awoke to find maybe an inch of snow on the ground.  School was closed and my honey's employer was offering liberal leave to all non-essential employees.  However, my honey is considered essential personnel.  At least one person from his office has to report to work and it's usually him as his office mate lives across the bridge and always has commuting issues in inclement weather.  He was getting really bummed about going in to work on a day where nothing would be going on and then battling snow and traffic to come home and shovel out a parking space.  Wow, it sounds awful when you say it out loud like that!  At the time, I just thought he was annoyed because I would be home and he'd have to go to work.   But, miraculously, his colleague from across the bridge volunteered to be the one to go in as the Eastern shore wasn't supposed to get much snow at all.

So, I guess Mother Nature interevened so we could spend the whole day together on our anniversary.  But, the joke was on my honey, as the snow never showed and it rained all day.  He took much ribbing at work the following day for staying home because of heavy rain showers and was repeatedly asked if he'd enjoyed his anniversary celebrations.  Oh well.  We did enjoy our anniversary day off, thank you very much.  My honey made me a world class meal and we got to snuggle all day.  Feel free to define snuggle any way you want to define it.

The following day at work the florist delivered the flowers that had been intended to arrive on our anniversary.  They were gerbera daisies, my favorite flowers, and they were gorgeous!

These arrived on the "better late than never" policy.

A different secretary brought these flowers up to my room, the friend who'd lamented making a comment about her husband spending too much on flowers.  She brought them up and stayed to see me unpack the flowers from the 1-800-Flowers box, as well as watch me read the card.  She told me she wanted to see if I teared up again when I read the card.  Apparently, the girls in the office talked about my reaction to flowers on Valentine's Day.  I got teary eyed, of course.  I told you he was good at expressing himself florally and in writing!  Then, my friend made a comment that caught me off guard.  She had seen the picture of my roses posted on Facebook and now the daisies arrival.  She asked me, "Don't you think he's setting the bar a little high?  He's never going to be able to keep this up."

I don't know if it's been set too high or not, so I'm throwing the question out to you, my dear readers. 

Has my honey set the bar so high this year that he won't be able to maintain it over time? 

Am I doomed for a let down in a year? Five years? A decade?

I'll be interested to hear your thoughts.