Happy Valentine's Day

I hate Valentine’s Day.  It’s even worse than New Year’s Eve, maybe because at least part of the New Year tradition includes imbibing.  Both occasions really suck if you’re single.  But if you’re married, do you really need a special day to be reminded to be romantic toward each other?  Where did all this nonsense start?

According to History.com, the history is little more than a legend, with several different versions.  Valentine was a priest in the third century in Rome.  Emperor Claudius II had an idea that unmarried men made better soldiers, so he outlawed marriage for young men.  But Valentine felt this was unjust so he continued to marry couples secretly, but when Claudius found out, he ordered Valentine be put to death.  In a similar version of the same story, a more romantic version, Valentine was imprisoned for helping Christians escape from Roman prisons.  While in prison, he fell in love with the jailor’s daughter who visited him, so before his death, he gave her a letter signed “From your Valentine.” (What’s wrong with this version?  I thought the guy was a priest.)

Others believe Valentine’s Day was set in the middle of February to “Christianize” the pagan ritual of Lupercalia, a fertility festival.  Another theory, from the Middle Ages, in France and England, it was commonly believed that February 14^th was the beginning of birds’ mating season.

The first known written Valentine still in existence was a poem written in 1415 by an English duke to his wife while he was imprisoned in the Tower of London.  The tradition of exchanging notes or small tokens of affection became popular in England in the 17^th century.  In America, handmade valentines were exchanged in the 1700s, but in 1840, a woman named Esther Howland began mass producing valentines.  Today, an estimated one billion valentine cards are sent, but 85% of them are purchased by women.

Valentine’s Day was a big deal for me in elementary school.  Everyone in the class got a cheap card, but the one designated to the secret crush had to have just the right message.  And what about those little heart-shaped candies that tasted like chalk but had messages on them like “Be mine” or “You’re cute”.  If only it was that easy in the adult years.

I’m not expecting any cards or roses this year, but I think I can get my hands on some chocolate to make this holiday worth celebrating.