14 February 2008

What is this "holiday" and who commercialized it?!

I want to start by pointing out that I'm not anti-love. I'm anti-needing a specific day to tell someone just how special they are to you. Are you kidding?! This should be EVERY day, not some commercialized hoax of a holiday. This is not a "I'm bitter because I'm single" rant either. I've had boyfriends on Valentine's Day; I've done the whole Valentine's Day thing. And I realized, that if I have to wait until February 14 to get flowers and whatever, then he's not the one for me. This shouldn't be some forced ritual...he should do it because he loves me.

Personally, I think we should return to the rumored traditions of the Romans:
To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification. The boys then sliced the goat's hide into strips, dipped them in the sacrificial blood and took to the streets, gently slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed being touched with the hides because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed.
This sounds much more promising than wearing red! Bring on the being slapped by blood covered hide!! And, to top it all off, we get paired up with a guy?! No awkward dating?! Sign me up!! Seriously though. I just received a text message from my friend. She says:
I truly hate Valentine's Day. The girls (at her office) are all talking about what they got their husbands and how much they hate the presents their husbands bought them.
Are you serious?! Be grateful he didn't forget the day! Which is possible, despite the over-advertisement of the day. I've heard plenty of wives/women complain that their husbands/boyfriends have forgotten the day. It's really disgusting...

So, I propose an abolition of Valentine's Day and instead propose that we use each day of the year to tell that special someone (or your friends/family) just how much you care and how much they mean to you.

1 comment:

Katie said...

I wouldn't bag it completely. Mostly because I like chocolate, and because my cute boss makes sugar cookies for all of her employees for any commercialized holidays.

Yes, you read that correctly. I only want to keep Valentine's Day for the food :)