Valentine's Day
I received a Valentine's Day present today. It was a small box with two chocolates in it that said "love your work - thank you". It's quite fitting that I would be the Valentine of my longest standing relationship - my employer. Eight years of commitment, love, personal growth and financial security. The perfect relationship. We should almost have our own day to celebrate, rather than be lumped in with all those other mushy teenagers, obligatory cards and stressed single girls.
Valentine's Day has long been hated on by yours truly. Perhaps being a feminist has taught me that I don't need no man to give me a cheap card and some limp dying plants to make me feel loved. Perhaps I have the internet to thank for reminding me every year that it is a day invented by Hallmark for the $$$. Perhaps the bitter, jaded, people I work with who bemoan their obligations to commit acts of love have made me never want to partake in it.
Or, it's just that I've never really had someone to do something silly and adorable with on February 14th. I've been in relationships over that time, a boyfriend once even sent me Valentine's day flowers. Regrettably, the florist mistook his instruction and wrote on the card;
"To the best of my girls,
Happy Valentine's Day"
Given our relationship was already on the rocks because of his suspected infidelity, and that I was relatively young and immature, being referred to as one of the many girls in his life (even accidentally) didn't exactly have the lovely effect he was hoping for. We were together for four years, so I am sure we celebrated V-Day other years, but given he was perpetually broke, jobless, and occasionally living in another state, the trauma of what I went through to get some affection any day, let alone a special day, has been blocked from my memory.
In the five years that have passed since that in-depth-four-year-learning-experience about the-value-of-being-able-to-walk-away-from-something-that-is-making-you-miserable, I have been in and out of relationships with men I would refer to as 'weird situations'. My friends would call them boyfriends. Either way, between the three of them, they have collectively managed to send me two meme's and one dick pic for V-Day, so I guess you can see why romance is dead in my eyes. Not that I am innocent on this score either, it's not like I am running around sending flowers and making extravagant declarations of love and desire while dancing to a mariachi band in their workplace.
But perhaps I should be. Two things have recently happened to me. Firstly, I was introduced to the works of French philosopher Albert Camus, which has led me to have a sort of 'nothing matters, life has no meaning, and we'll all be dead soon' epiphany. Ultimately, this has mostly led to me saying fuck it, I'm having a third coffee today, but it's also made me a lot more willing to just do what I want without caring. Although, I should say my proclivity for shooting innocent men in streams isn't quite as strong as Meursalt's, so my next post hopefully won't be from prison.
Secondly, I was challenged today about the reasons we as society continue to celebrate Valentine's Day, even though we know it's all a bunch of contrived marketing plans. One of my colleagues posed an interesting theory, and I have to say I struggled to rebuke it. We only take the time to celebrate someone's ability to be alive another year on their birthday. We only celebrate (endure?) the death/birth of religious figures on certain days. We only pause to remember our brave war heroes on certain days. We only celebrate the greatest of all days, the Hottest 100, on a certain day. Why should we not celebrate love on a certain day?
As a society we certainly don't go out of our way to tell people that we love them. Or even that we like them. We're all so busy being selfish ass-holes all the time, that we forget that others are likely thinking the same thing as us, that everyone else is a selfish ass-hole. Maybe we do need a special day to make us stop and do something nice for the people we love.
So, tell someone you love them. Buy someone a present for no reason. Send flowers, or chocolates, or a card. Who cares if it's tacky? None of it has any meaning, and we're all going to die soon anyway.
Valentine's Day has long been hated on by yours truly. Perhaps being a feminist has taught me that I don't need no man to give me a cheap card and some limp dying plants to make me feel loved. Perhaps I have the internet to thank for reminding me every year that it is a day invented by Hallmark for the $$$. Perhaps the bitter, jaded, people I work with who bemoan their obligations to commit acts of love have made me never want to partake in it.
Or, it's just that I've never really had someone to do something silly and adorable with on February 14th. I've been in relationships over that time, a boyfriend once even sent me Valentine's day flowers. Regrettably, the florist mistook his instruction and wrote on the card;
"To the best of my girls,
Happy Valentine's Day"
Given our relationship was already on the rocks because of his suspected infidelity, and that I was relatively young and immature, being referred to as one of the many girls in his life (even accidentally) didn't exactly have the lovely effect he was hoping for. We were together for four years, so I am sure we celebrated V-Day other years, but given he was perpetually broke, jobless, and occasionally living in another state, the trauma of what I went through to get some affection any day, let alone a special day, has been blocked from my memory.
In the five years that have passed since that in-depth-four-year-learning-experience about the-value-of-being-able-to-walk-away-from-something-that-is-making-you-miserable, I have been in and out of relationships with men I would refer to as 'weird situations'. My friends would call them boyfriends. Either way, between the three of them, they have collectively managed to send me two meme's and one dick pic for V-Day, so I guess you can see why romance is dead in my eyes. Not that I am innocent on this score either, it's not like I am running around sending flowers and making extravagant declarations of love and desire while dancing to a mariachi band in their workplace.
But perhaps I should be. Two things have recently happened to me. Firstly, I was introduced to the works of French philosopher Albert Camus, which has led me to have a sort of 'nothing matters, life has no meaning, and we'll all be dead soon' epiphany. Ultimately, this has mostly led to me saying fuck it, I'm having a third coffee today, but it's also made me a lot more willing to just do what I want without caring. Although, I should say my proclivity for shooting innocent men in streams isn't quite as strong as Meursalt's, so my next post hopefully won't be from prison.
Secondly, I was challenged today about the reasons we as society continue to celebrate Valentine's Day, even though we know it's all a bunch of contrived marketing plans. One of my colleagues posed an interesting theory, and I have to say I struggled to rebuke it. We only take the time to celebrate someone's ability to be alive another year on their birthday. We only celebrate (endure?) the death/birth of religious figures on certain days. We only pause to remember our brave war heroes on certain days. We only celebrate the greatest of all days, the Hottest 100, on a certain day. Why should we not celebrate love on a certain day?
As a society we certainly don't go out of our way to tell people that we love them. Or even that we like them. We're all so busy being selfish ass-holes all the time, that we forget that others are likely thinking the same thing as us, that everyone else is a selfish ass-hole. Maybe we do need a special day to make us stop and do something nice for the people we love.
So, tell someone you love them. Buy someone a present for no reason. Send flowers, or chocolates, or a card. Who cares if it's tacky? None of it has any meaning, and we're all going to die soon anyway.
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