That's right, kids,
Valentine's Day is almost here!
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| Yep, that's the one! |
As far as I'm concerned,
Valentine's Day is good for only two things:
- Identifying the emotionally stunted and/or embittered, and
- Having lots of hot sex.
Since you can have lots of
hot sex any day of the year, that means it's really only good for one
thing. Besides, I can't approve of any holiday that seems designed to
create hard feelings and misery. If
you're single on Valentine's Day, you're almost obligated to hate
yourself (and your meaningless existence) for at
least that 24-hour period, even if you're perfectly happy the rest of
the year. If you're not single on Valentine's Day, you might
nevertheless feel bewildered, panicky, confused, and even secretly
(or not so secretly) resentful. Seriously, I've never met anyone who
claims to like this holiday. Well, except for children, but that's
because they always receive valentines. It's required.
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| By law. |
So why
do we celebrate Valentine's Day? Actually, no one really knows.
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| This whole situation is dodgy as hell. ~ Abigail Batchelder |
1) The
Saint Valentine in question could be one of at least three, or
possibly more, people. “Valentine” was a popular name back in the
day.
The two most likely candidates are Valentine of Rome and Valentine of Terni.
Valentine of Terni was martyred first, in about 197 AD. Valentine of
Rome was martyred about 269 AD. Both were buried on the Via Flaminia,
supposedly on 14 February. A third Valentine was martyred along with
some of his friends somewhere in Africa, but we don't know where or
when. Yet another Saint Valentine, Valentine of Genua, was a bishop
who died in 307 AD and has a feast day on 2 May.
Legend has it that Saint Valentine (of Rome, probably) was martyred by
Emperor Claudius II for performing marriages in secret. Apparently,
Claudius II had outlawed marriages for young men in an effort to
strengthen the military, in the belief that bachelors make better
soldiers.
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| Valentine disagreed. |
This
may, of course, be bullsh*t. It's certainly bullsh*t that Valentine
himself wrote, on the night before his death sentence was carried
out, the first-ever Valentine's card to his sweetheart, signed, “From
your Valentine.” American Greetings made that up. You know, to sell more cards.
2) Some
trace the practice of Valentine's Day as a celebration of romantic
love back to Geoffrey Chaucer, who, in 1382, wrote a poem
memorializing the engagement of King Richard II of England to Anne of
Bohemia. Chaucer's poem is the first historical mention of a Saint
Valentine's Day. The betrothal treaty was signed on 2 May 1381, the
feast day of Saint Valentine of Genua, which is not
our Valentine's Day, because we would've noticed that.
3) The practice of celebrating Saint Valentine's Day on 14
February, and its associations with romantic love, may go back to the
Roman festival of Lupercalia. Lupercalia was a fertility rite that
occurred from 13-15 February and probably involved lots of hot sex.
According to this dubious website, young Roman men drew the names of
young women from a lottery, and then got to bang whoever they picked
all year long.
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| I know the Romans were total pervs, but I'm not sure I believe that. |
4) The
oldest existing valentine was poem from Charles, Duke of Orleans to
his wife. It dates back to the 1400s. If I remember my historical
novels correctly, Charles was taken prisoner by the English at the
battle of Agincourt and spent a sh*tload of years locked up in the
Tower of London. That's where he sent the valentine from.
5) Up until
the 19th century, most people wrote out their valentines
by hand. Books such as The Young Man's Valentine Writer, published
in 1797, offered love poems for those without literary talents. The
19th century brought cheaper postal rates and the
proliferation of mass-produced valentine cards in the UK. The
tradition traveled to America in 1847, when Esther Howland, daughter
of a stationer, began producing and distributing them in
Massachusetts.
Americans
today send 190 million valentines, half of which are exchanged
between parents and children or other family members, other than
spouses. The nation's schoolchildren produce about almost a billion
valentines each year; teachers and children therefore receive more
valentines than anyone else.
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| See, I told you. Didn't I tell you? |
