By Gina Angostura
Columnist

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For the uncoupled woman, Valentine’s Day is a stress fest that begins at least a month ahead of time when that “seasonal” aisle at the supermarket turns vile shades of red and pink.

V-Day, as I like to call it, is nothing but an onslaught of products promoting forced emotion, including sappy cards fi lled with phrases nobody really says and nobody wants to hear anyway, teddy bears holding hearts in their disgustingly sweet little claws, and, worst of all, those little candy hearts that say things like “Luv U” and “B Mine” that taste nasty but that we put in bowls on our desks and eat anyway, simply because they’re there.

I’m looking for ones that say “Bite me” this year. That way, it’ll look like a handy candy-eating instruction, but it will really be an admonishment to all the men who have spurned me in the past.

Valentine’s Day, of course, began centuries ago when Mr. Valentine forgot to bring Mrs. Valentine roses, so she martyred him, making him patron saint of forgetful husbands.

Back in the days before the divorce, I expected something nice on V-Day. Not expensive or showy, but something. And woe to my husband if he didn’t produce.

But I’m not just a taker, I’m a giver, too. I once covered the window of our married student apartment with cutout construction-paper hearts and bordered it with paper scallops made to look like lace using a hole punch, all to welcome him home from class. I can hardly believe that was me. It’s so sweet it makes me want to vomit now. I count that as two of the many hours of my life I wish I had back again.

And I did have a nice Valentine’s Day last year when I actually was dating someone. Well, we weren’t actually dating. I thought we’d broken up. In fact, I’m sure we had, fi ve weeks before. We hadn’t spoken that whole time.

But lo and behold, on Valentine’s Day, I get lovely fl owers and a box in the mail full of gifts – books, a bracelet and a little pewter heart. He didn’t answer my thank you call, didn’t write, and we haven’t talked since.

What that was all about will remain a mystery to me forever, I guess. My theory is that he’d bought that stuff way ahead and thought he’d send it along anyway. That doesn’t explain the fl owers, though, does it. I’m bemused by it more than anything. Although writing it down, it does seem kinda creepy.

So forgive me if I’m a little jaded about the holiday.

By the time you read this, V-Day will have come and gone. This year, I don’t expect anything. If you don’t expect, you aren’t disappointed.

But I’m cool with it. Just look for me wandering the aisles after Tuesday, buying half-priced chocolate to eat to help me forget. And once you mash it violently between your teeth, it’s not heartshaped anymore, so it’s not a reminder of one more disappointing holiday.

Oh well. Someday my prince will come. And he’d better bring roses.