A2 Monday, February 14, 2022 — DAILY REPUBLIC
Valentine’s Day with a Disney focus
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Those Disney cards have heard and actually have been one were the gold standard of those people who and you didn’t give decried the “everybody those to just gets a trophy” mentality. anybody, did you? I mean, life just ain’t like Well, in a word, yes. that. I’m writing this the In the I Grew Up in Friday before Super Fairfield Too Facebook Bowl Sunday so I don’t group, locals shared Tony Wade about Valentine’s Days know who is now the The last laugh Super Bowl champion, of their childhoods: but what I do know is Michelle Ryan that the NFL didn’t decide to Myers: This year my grandgive the loser an identical daughter’s fourth-grade class Lombardi award. has the option to do it the way Now some may say that the we did it back in the day. She “everybody gets a trophy” thing opted out. She said, “It’s not like is a new phenomenon, but I I love everyone in my class, have evidence to the contrary: Grandma. I mean I like them, Valentine’s Day back when but not enough to give them a I was a kid. love card.” Here’s how it went down: Cynthia Simpson: That was You bought a box of Valentine’s actually a good idea. When we cards and then were forced to didn’t do it that way, I give one to every single kid in got maybe two. the class. That bully, Rick Linda Kelley: We had it that Moriarity, who punched me in you signed a card, but didn’t the stomach near the monkey address it. You could make out bars at recess? He gets a one for the whole class. The valentine. Susan Yak, who I teacher put them all in a box have had a crush on since first and we had a Valentine’s grade? She gets a valentine. The parade where we just stuck our new kid whose name I can’t hand in and picked out a card. It remember who wears pants that was fun seeing whose you got are flooding and always smells and how many from the same like peanut butter? He gets person. I remember it as a valentine. just being fun. I was like a prepubescent Chuck Davis: In elementary Oprah Winfrey: “You get a school we had to give cards to valentine! You get a valentine! everyone in class, but I spent a You get a valentine! Everybody lot of time going through the box gets a valentine!” of cards to find just the right It was ludicrous. ones for the girls I liked. Then I Still, it messed with my head would spend more time carewhen I got one from a girl I had fully selecting the heart candies with the words I wanted them to a crush on (Susan Yak was just read. All the rest just went one of a long stream of girls I willy-nilly into the envelopes. I never, ever talked to but my was very clever, maybe a little eyes adored. So close, so close too clever because it never and yet so far). What I mean is, worked! And still does not to this if they gave me a generic day. I need to up my game. drugstore valentine, that was Maybe some Haiku. . . . one thing. But if I got one that I came across a 1965 ad from featured a Walt Disney characRagle’s Pharmacy which used ter, well now, that was to be located downtown at something altogether different.
Courtesy illustration
Tony Wade as a Sith Lord, his wife Beth as a Jedi Knight and their pooch Chunky Tiberius Wade as a Jedi Master in the Valentine’s Day art Tony had made for Beth. 932 Texas St., which I thought at a quick glance was about Valentine’s Day. It was not. The two big letters highlighted “VD” referred to . . . well, venereal disease. Sorry for taking this column in an awkward direction just now. Anyway, I know many people get stressed about Valentine’s Day. Single people, couples, married folks: It can be viewed like some sort of test of love or something. It has never been that way for me personally. I usually get my wife Beth a card and we go out to eat. However, a couple of years ago we decided, just for us, to not use food as
BRIGHT spot
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celebration anymore. I also did not get her a card this year (generic or Disney), much less jewelry or anything like that. My gift mixed old school with our shared pop culture geekiness. Make Me Jedi, a company that creates personalized works of art, lured me in with their unique and fun products. Well, that and their 50% off Valentine’s Day deal. Our artwork features me as a Sith Lord (Raiders fans are all Sith Lords), Beth as a Jedi and our pooch Chunky Tiberius Wade as a Jedi Master about to put a rebel beat down
on someone. Oh, and I just remembered that Star Wars is owned by Disney now so it ties back to our childhood nicely. I’m not giving one to anybody else, though. Fairfield freelance humor columnist and accidental local historian Tony Wade writes two weekly columns: “The Last Laugh” on Mondays and “Back in the Day” on Fridays, although sometimes he mixes things around to suit his purposes, like he did with this column. Wade is also the author of The History Press book “Growing Up In Fairfield, California.”
