Sentimentality, the ostentatious parading of excessive and spurious emotion, is the mark of dishonesty, the inability to feel; the wet eyes of the sentimentalist betray his aversion to experience, his fear of life, his arid heart; and it is always, therefore, the signal of secret and violent inhumanity, the mask of cruelty.

There are times when I feel like my lack of interest in common celebrations makes me seem like an apathetic fuck, but I don’t really care. Not that I consider it a detriment, but the biggest issue I have with my attitudes on being sentimental, which is to say that I am not, is in the explanation to others who normally don’t seem to understand. But believe me, I’m okay with it.

It all started a while back. Maybe I was thirty the first time I intentionally threw away a birthday card, before then I either collected them in a shoe box that at the time was packed with cards from as long as I could remember, or I just lost them. The day I finally threw them out I realized they were just a symbol of something that ended the moment the card was selected and storing them forever was pointless. I haven’t cared for a birthday, either mine or anyone else’s, since those cards made their way to the landfill.

But that was just the tip of an iceberg that now I realize eventually turned my life around — because what is the point of buying flowers on February 14th when a day later they cost a quarter of the price? And why depend on a calendar instead of celebrating marriage every day? Or where did all the Christmas traditions come from, and what do they mean? Is tradition really a good basis for value, anyway?

It took twenty years from the day I tossed those cards to make the transition into who I am today. Only a few people in my life then understood or cared enough to look beyond the changes they saw in me, and over time the rest slowly withdrew. Why? I don’t know, but I think some people probably depend on traditional expression as proof of love, which is a mistake I don’t mind living with.