Valentine's Day

I originally assumed that Valentine's Day was put there for the express purpose of giving guys a convenient way to redeem themselves after being a complete ass on Superbowl weekend. Imagine my surprise when I found out that the truth was, in fact, much worse.

Actually the Valentine's Day celebration dates back to ancient Rome. On the eve of Lupercalia (luper rhyming with Super, and calia meaning chalice, which is a bowl: a spring festival for the gods), boys and girls would draw names to be paired off for the duration of the festival, and in some lucky instances, life.

Now, anyone who's ever been to a junior high school dance knows the horror of this strategy. In fact, when polled, 4 out of 5 adolescents would have preferred to be the victim of human sacrifice than risk picking the name of the village idiot for Lupercalia.

Anyhow, subsequently the holiday was re-named for a priest (that would be Priest Valentine, for you slower folks) because he performed secret marriage ceremonies for soldiers, when it was illegal to do so.

The emperor at the time, Claudius (who is best remembered for his slow wit, and for marrying the biggest slut in Europe) took it upon himself to forbid soldiers from marrying. This was based on his logic that soldiers had to be willing to travel for, oh, decades at a time, and were required to be available for raping and pillaging at moments' notice, without the inconvenience of fidelity to consider. That, and keeping up the female headcount at orgies.

This "Valentine" character decided that just because Claudius was emperor and everybody now celebrated his low intelligence as a ruse of the brilliant (probably because he could pretty much take out the entire lineage of anybody who refused this opinion) that this particular policy was, in a word, idiotic.

Predictably, he didn't last long. Romans were notorious tattle-tales. His execution (whack!) for this high crime took place on the eve of Lupercalia. But this actually turned out to be a good thing, since to get promoted to "Saint," you pretty much HAVE to be dead.

And so it goes, we have a sweet name for February 14^th: St. Valentine's Day. Rather than "The Eve of Lupercalia" which is much more cumbersome. With the additional perk that you don't actually HAVE to hang around with a major loser, just because he/she sent you a card.

But, as is common with crowds, we seem to have overshot the mark. And now it's expected, even required of anyone who IS paired off to observe the occasion by means of gaudy greeting cards and/or heart-shaped soap-on-a-rope.

Some gentlemen argue that the mere fact that they're EXPECTED to produce makes them uncomfortable (though not quite as uncomfortable as, say, wearing skimpy lingerie in the dead of winter…) Or that Valentine's Day is "Amateur Day," and therefore not to be observed by serious romantics. Which is kind of true, excepting that anybody who resorts to these flimsy tactics to weasel his way out of buying a two dollar card, pretty much wrecks his chances of making the "serious romantic" list.

As an opportunity to express appreciation for one's counterpart, Valentine's Day is unparalleled. Which is why we women have come to appreciate that whomever we find ourselves in love with, or in some cases married to, we can pretty much look forward to "more of the same, plus a silly red card."

Might I suggest that we bow to tradition, and begin to celebrate this hallowed occasion as it was intended. Meaning GENTLEMEN that, just like in the Superbowl, win or lose, everybody gets a RING.