Chris Pascoe’s Fun Tales

Love is blind… especially to the subtleties of modern greetings cards

My mum and dad are a real pair of old romantics. Well into their eighties, they not only still buy each other Valentine cards, they display them on the mantelpiece right through the year, before replacing them with new ones come February 14.

Sitting in their lounge the other day, drinking my cup of three-sugared white tea (I actually drink un-sugared black coffee but no matter what I ask for, Dad brings me the syrupy tea), I idly glanced at the cards on the mantelpiece. Dad’s Valentine card to Mum was a huge flowery affair, complete with ribbons and bows. Mum’s to Dad was much plainer and simpler, featuring two stick figures of the type universally seen on lavatory doors (already going well with this, wasn’t she) holding hands, above the words, you+me= love. As I stared at the card, I began to sense something was slightly wrong with it, but I couldn’t quite place it. Then it hit me – both of the stick figures would feature only on a gentlemen’s lavatory door. Mum hadn’t quite paid attention when buying this card.

“Mum,” I said, trying not to burst out laughing. “That Valentine card? Where did you get it? That’s two men on the front.”

As I stared at the card I sensed something slightly wrongwith it

Mum stared at it. “Oh. I suppose they are, aren’t they? I got it in a lovely shop in Brighton. I like the understated ones, you see.”

Understated? I thought the card made quite a clear statement, in all truth.

At this point, Dad’s head suddenly sank into his hands.

“Oh no,” he muttered, shaking his head vigorously. We regarded him without much surprise; this was quite normal behaviour for Dad.

“Reg the builder was round last week,” he said. “Kept looking at that card…”

Reg the builder, he who accidentally dismantled my neighbour’s roof a few columns back, has become quite a family friend of my parents, and thought nothing