Valentine’s Day is one of those times when you suddenly find yourself with urges.  These might relate to an Ex, a past event, a sudden feeling of aloneness, and maybe the impulse to do something about it: make a phone call, send a email, try to connect—with something.

I know in a moment of fear, I did that last year: a random reach out. I was met with a promptly-returned voicemail from the man in question: “I don’t think that’s a good idea…I don’t think we could transcend…what happened…”

Well, we won’t get into what happened, except to say that thankfully, that phone call answered the question of whether anything else was to happen after that.

This year I didn’t need to make a call. I was very close to sending an email, but was interrupted by three phone calls from different friends. And because I was in tune, I took the calls as the Halt sign I was secretly waiting for.

This was going to be a platonic free love V-day, and I’d have to embrace it.

Not only that, but it was an important evening. I was performing in the show SICK, and it was our Opening Night, which was a wonderful way to forget flowers, candy, and dinner hype. My co-stars and the public were my date, acting, my love. That’s where it is at right now.

Afterwards, there was plenty of wine and conversation. People thirsted for answers about the play.

Then, Monday hit and it was back to the “should I contact” mode.

I re-read the email I didn’t send that was looming in the drafts file. I deleted it. This makes no sense. This is for you to know.

I am trying to simplify things, after all.

And so, the next day, the would-be email receiver instead received a clear text message.