Dear St. Valentine, What's the Big Deal Anyway? valentine s day 2011 approaches...

Why Is Valentines a Big Deal? History First!

Valentine's hisotry in 30 seconds:

Was he a Roman? Was he a Saint? Was he real? Was he a "he"? Was the depth of his knowledge of romantic ideas and romance deeper than the Mariana Trench? You can Google Valentines history and get the same information I did on St. Valentine, erm, Valentines, or, uh, whatever his/her name really was. What we know-ish:

• Possibly male.
• Possibly Roman who defied Claudius and continued performing marriages.
• Possibly did some time in jail and practiced some smooth romantic ideas on his female guard. Probably scribbled something romantic like, "Conjugal visits, mi-lady? -Your Valentine" (OK, not so romantic).
• Possibly none of the above and was a Christian Saint living in a Roman world and helping fellow Christians escape religious persecution.

Why do we celebrate Valentine's day if we don't even know what it's all about? Or if we don't even know who this Valentine person was?

Before you go up in arms, calm down, I'm going somewhere that will indicate to you this is not an overarching sexist generalization, but rather a lead to hook you in to read what's coming a smirk.  It's Valentine's!  It's supposed to be romantic!

Women like Valentine's day. A lot. Probably more than romantic comedies. Actually, let's hear from you. With this incredibly sexist and objectifying poll that I hope none of you take too seriously, which do the ladies prefer more? Valentines day or romantic comedies?

Remember that lead and hook I mentioned earlier? Here's where it's going. According to the Greeting Card Association, women buy 80% of all greeting cards each year and 85% of all Valentines greeting cards . This does not answer the "why do we celebrate valentines" question, but it fuels the fire to speculate with some irreverent direction.

But this seems a bit sexist, doesn't it? Don't the fellas enjoy romance and passion on Valentines, too?

Yes and no. To generalize which gender get more romantic about Valentine's day more based on who buys greeting cards, diamonds, or cologne doesn't offer us a valid answer to the question "Why is Valentine's day a big deal". If anything, it's an amusing distraction that will finish running its course in about 1 more capsule.

With that, men do spend more money on Valentines than women, though. According to Joanna Douglas's article on Yahoo. On average amount of money Valentine's day depletes the bank accounts of each hard working American man is about $151.87. That's double of the average of what each woman will spend, $75.89.

What's with the discrepancy?

Here's one very small piece of the puzzle that in no way offers a final answer for all things considered on the valentines gift price discrepancy.

• Women tend to buy Valentines things like cologne for men (do guys really stink that badly?).
• Men, on the other hand, buy shiny rocks to win the affection of their female counterparts. Gold, diamonds, silver, platinum, etc.
• My friends say it all depends on the individual, not the gender. (A very enlightened answer!)

Ladies, what would you do if your gentleman lover, with all his romantic wisdom, decided to express his sentiments of romance with a perfume purchase?

Still not getting a clear answer to the romance question of the century, "Why do we celebrate Valentines?" So far we covered:

• Veiled and mysterious history bordering on myth territory.
• Greeting card perpetuated holiday.
• Capitalist and gender role conditioning conspiracy theory.

Other possible candidates lacking detail or explanation:

• Because our parents or society raised us to believe in it, therefore its continued celebration is of a sociological/nurture origin.
• Because of religious influence on which holidays we celebrate in the USA.
• Because romance genetically rushes through our veins and impulsively drives us to show massive quantities of affection to our mate of interest every Februrary 14th due to an astrological planet and star alignment at the time of the cesspool cell splicing party that possibly began life on earth.
• Because God declared that we must celebrate Valentines.
• Because Chuck Norris told God that we must celebrate Valentines.

We can choose to boycott Valentine's day. We can choose to love everything romantic about Valentine's day. We can choose to accept some of the stereotypes forced on us. Ultimately, whatever you want it to be, or don't care for it to be anything at all, it's your choice to make a romantic Valentine's day a big deal or not.

I think the big deal with Valentine's day is an arbitrary value judgment and only receives as much meaning as we choose to give it. Like almost all things in life, for me it sets the stage to bring someone I love lots of LOLs and lots of romance, pink bathrobe and all.

If you hate these kinds of holidays, make fun of them and give someone a smile!

If you love Valentine's day, all the romance, all the romantic ideas, romantic gestures, romantic cards; etc., embrace it, go with it, Valentine your pink little "be mine" candy hearts out.

If you choose a partner who loves Valentines, but you hate Valentines and romance (or vice versa), ultimately we can also choose whether or not celebrating this with them will compromise our self-respect. If the person you emotionally open yourself up to and share vulnerabilities with treats you cruely, withdraws affection, or gives you ultimatums about Valentine's day, perhaps this could be the most liberating and most recent life changing Valentines you've experienced in a long time!

So what's the big deal with Valentine's day? What's the big deal with romance? We make it as big of a deal as we want it to be. There's so much more up for discussion, and hopefully this will not only inspire some romance or spark your Valentine's brain to think of romantic ideas, but it will also make this holiday a thoughtful, reflective holiday whereas normally we treat it like just another greeting card.

Be mine, Valentine?