cupid shmupid

OK, honestly - is there anyone out there who truly loves Valentine's Day? even Mother Nature today seems to be sending a clear message: this holiday blows.

i actually used to love Valentine's Day when i was a kid. at school, we'd always be able to ditch the uniforms for a day and wear red, white and pink "dress down" clothes (which was probably annoying for the boys, but fantastic for the girls). i remember having to decorate paper bags with markers and construction paper - the bags, of course, would hold all the little flimsy (but somehow still awesome) Valentines everyone would write out for everyone else in the class. at the end of the day, you had 23 cards, covered with cartoon characters and silly messages. how could you not feel loved? at home my mom usually gave me some cute little piece of heart-themed jewelry, and i think my dad bought me flowers. i'm sure there was chocolate. (where there was me, there was chocolate.) then we'd go out to a nice dinner, our little family. how could i not adore February 14th?

then it all changed in sixth grade. Valentine's Day rolled around and i don't think i was paying much attention - i was busy with play rehearsals and struggling with pre-Algebra and planning my wedding to Joey McIntyre. then, not long after lunch, one of my best friends came running up to me with a cheesy little pink teddy bear in her hand. it was a gift - from a boy! a boy who was apparently her boyfriend! i so didn't understand the concept of dating then - i mean, what could you do together at age 12? where could you go? the family room, to watch Growing Pains? how romantic. and she wasn't the only one. suddenly all the girls around me had various five-dollar Valentine's gifts (the kind stashed by the cash register in drug stores, the ones found in the 'seasonal' aisle in the grocery store) all from the boys in our grade - boys we'd been in school with since kindergarten, some of whom we'd seen pee their pants in the library, or cry in gym class. they had to be kidding me.

of course, my indignation was just a cover-up. deep down i felt like a gigantic freak for not getting any stupid gifts myself. there were no boys breaking out in hives waiting for the perfect time (perhaps between Social Studies and Language Arts?) to hand me a plastic rose or a glow-in-the-dark heart pin. and not only was i not the recipient of any pre-pubescent love tokens, i hadn't even known i should have been. how had i missed all these developments, all these changes? the truth is, at that point i didn't want to be anyone's faux girlfriend. i had braces, a bad perm and besides, i was saving myself for Joey. but that's the funny thing about this holiday, isn't it? even when you're content with the way things are, something about all the jewelry commercials and shelves of heart-shaped boxes and endless mushy cards in Hallmark make you feel like you're missing something, like your life would be so much sweeter if only you had someone to love.

i might not have been fully aware of it, but i think i realized that afternoon in February of 1989 that Valentine's Day is a mostly insincere and manufactured load of crap. real love can't be celebrated in one day, can't be expressed with flowers that wilt or teddy bears with unnaturally-colored fur. i don't think love should get a holiday. it lets too many people off the hook the other 364 days of the year. so, no thanks, i'll skip the cupid hoopla and wait another month and three days for a holiday i can really get behind - St. Patty's Day.

mb