Every Feb. 14, the world narrows to prix fixe menus, a CVS aisle swathed in pink and the panic of trying to secure a reservation somewhere dimly lit enough. Love, we are told, is happening at a two-top.
But this Valentine’s Day, I’m thinking about all the people who have steadied me and shaped me into who I am.
Valentine’s Day is supposed to be about romance. Fine. Let it be. But what do we actually mean by romance? If it’s commitment, growth and consistently choosing someone, then romance includes more people than we might expect. If we’re being honest about who has witnessed the real arc of our becoming, the answer is rarely just the person we’re dating. This year, we should extend our love to our non-romantic partners — not as a consolation prize or an afterthought, but as a front-and-center display of affection.
In October, a viral Vogue article asked, “Is Having a Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” The premise was that in certain circles, having a boyfriend has become vaguely cringeworthy in an era that prizes independence and detachment. We are encouraged to be booked, busy and unbothered. Thus, any type of earnest attachment can read as embarrassing.
To me, it’s not that romance is embarrassing, but that we have overinflated its prominence. It has become the primary narrative of our personhood and the lens through which we interpret our worth, maturity and success, even though most of our lives — and loves — unfold outside the romantic realm, in the friendships that keep us afloat. Why can’t we appreciate all the love in our lives?
Since our non-romantic relationships are built on a solid foundation of shared history, we start to subconsciously believe they can withstand neglect. The irony is that they feel solid precisely because we have, in fact, tended to them over time. Once that foundation is built, we can mistake durability for invincibility. We start to assume these relationships will survive on scraps — the raincheck that doesn’t get rescheduled, the half-hearted “we need to catch up soon,” the lack of reliance on your friend because you’ve already processed everything with your partner. But to treat that kind of intimacy as self-sustaining is to misunderstand how it was built in the first place. Friendships are elastic. They stretch around new partners, new jobs, new cities. When those relationships are always the ones bending, they start to thin.
On the other hand, romantic love is often immediate and all-consuming. Texts are answered quickly, and plans are prioritized. We try to prove, subtly or not, that we are attentive, desirable and committed. Romance, especially in the early stages, feels fragile, so we overcorrect by pouring ourselves into it entirely, sometimes without realizing that we’re quietly pulling away from other, equally important parts of our lives.
When we let those relationships fall to the wayside, their absence weighs heavily. There’s a unique loneliness that comes not from being single, but from lacking deep platonic intimacy. Especially around Valentine’s Day, we pathologize romantic singleness, but we rarely acknowledge how isolating it feels to realize you don’t have anyone to talk to or to rely on.
So, let’s not let that happen. Instead, let’s look inward and recognize how important our friendships are, regardless of our relationship status. Let’s make sure that this appreciation is actually felt by our friends. Sending love to our non-romantic partners means recognizing that they are partners in the truest sense — they’ve talked us through disaster, challenged our worst instincts and celebrated our smallest wins. These partners, too, deserve genuine gestures. Not a cutesy Galentines dinner where we all pretend to hate men while having boyfriends waiting for us at home. Not a meme about how “soulmates aren’t always romantic.” I mean intentional gratitude. Write your best friend from home the long text you keep meaning to send. Mail your sibling a postcard that made you think of them. Send flowers to your friend who just started a new job.
We reserve grand gestures for romance because we think romance is rare. But deep friendship is rarer, harder and, frankly, more impressive. You don’t need to wait for love if you already have it, because love is not just who you date. So, this Valentine’s Day, send your love to those who have been standing beside you all along.
If you have questions about sex or relationships that could be discussed in a future column, please submit questions to an anonymous form at https://tinyurl.com/BDHsexcolumn. Anusha Gupta ’25 MD’29 can be reached at anusha_gupta@brown.edu. Please send responses to this opinion to letters@browndailyherald.com and other op-eds to opinions@browndailyherald.com.
