Kim of Hiraeth’s posting of antique valentines and Lydia of The Purple Cellar’s Valentine’s post stirred my memory and sent me on a little walk down memory lane too. I recognized the valentines Kim posted, which, I suppose, makes me an antique too. Valentine’s Day in the third grade seems to be a significant year for me, since it’s the one I remember the most. It’s the year of my great achievement in poetry, and it’s the year of The Valentine Box. Before the great day of the Valentine exchange, we were told to make a box with a slot in the top so our classmates could ‘post’ our valentines. I used a shoe box, hoping that it would be filled to the top. I first covered it with red construction paper. Then I made the piece de resistance—the hearts—to decorate it. I cut them out of red construction paper, then I gathered strips of white crepe paper into ruffles and glued them behind the hearts. Ruffled hearts covered! that box! Then I wrote ‘Be My Valentine’ on each side. I’m telling you, it was a thing of beauty. It must have been a shining day for me, what with the Box and the Poem and all. And besides that, I got a couple of valentines from the boy who sat behind me and pulled my pigtails. He had such great penmanship…