Friday, February 1, 2013

Uprooted plant life and sugar-saturated caffeinated fat blocks. You shouldn't have.


   With January making its exit stage right and February entering left, we are all anticipating a certain day taking center: Valentine's Day. The one day a year that, next to Christmas and all other major holidays, has been so crassly commercialized that everyone in the mainstream world has grown to loathe for different reasons.

     I remember the days in elementary school when everyone in my class would decorate Valentine's Day shoeboxes with little slits cut in the top so people could put in valentines and an assortment of candy. It was fun and cute and we had to make a valentine for everyone in the class so nobody was left out. Those were the days. Since then I've become one of those people in the mainstream world who has grown to loathe Valentine's Day. In fact, I think it's been that way since middle school when an ex-crush of mine gave all the other girls candy one year and purposely didn't give me any because I dumped him right before Christmas break that year (of which he terrorized me until 8th grade graduation that year). The following two years after that I was either sick or just had nothing to do that day. Then the next year I made plans with a guy friend of mine and he blew me off to hang out with another girl (who ended up being a psycho). The year after that I made the effort to at least buy valentines for my family and then-boyfriend. Then I was newly single the next year, and then I had a guy to celebrate with for three years, and now I'm single again (this is my first time publicly admitting it). Through the ups and downs and having someone to celebrate with and then not have someone to celebrate with, I'm pretty sure my hatred for Valentine's Day has remained constant. Or maybe just went dormant for the last three years and then came back with a passion the other day when I saw Valentine's Day crap all over the shelves at Winn-Dixie and had to fight the urge to suffocate myself with a teddy bear. I don't know. All I know is that I hate it and think it's the stupidest holiday ever. But at least this time I have good logical reasons for hating it.
Couldn't have said it better, honestly.
    First reason why I can't stand Valentine's Day is because people treat it like it's the only day of the year to go all-out balls to the wall celebrating your love for someone. One person (usually the girl) has all these crazy expectations about how romantic the whole day/night should be and wants the moon given to them in a silver Tiffany's box, and ends up getting mad at the other person (usually the guy) when all they get is a dozen roses and a box of chocolate. First of all, shouldn't you be celebrating your love for that person more often than Valentine's Day? Like every day maybe? Second of all, if your romantic expectations aren't like this any other day, why are they so high on this particular day? It's ironic to me because on any ordinary day of the year it's completely the most romantic wonderful thing when your SO does something thoughtful for you, yet for some reason those same little gestures are just not as good because this overrated, ordinary-day-turned-holiday caused your expectations to skyrocket. It's like you purposely set yourselves up for disappointment.
"I love you so much I hope you never die."
    See, it never used to be like this. Valentine's Day used to be a pagan celebration of fertility, then became dedicated to a saint when pagans began converting to Christianity as a means to make the celebration less sacrilegious. Or some long story along those lines. Then somewhere in the 19th century it turned into a thing for kids where they glued some macaroni to a paper heart and gave it to their parents and called it a valentine. And then they ate chocolate. Then advertisers got a hold of it and commercialized it to this ridiculous degree that now if a guy doesn't plan a huge romantic night and buy his woman some overpriced jewelry or some other crap, then he's in the doghouse. Which brings me to my next question. Why does nobody ever get angry at the women for not making an effort on Valentine's Day?? This type of nonsense should go both ways, ladies!
    The next thing I can't stand about Valentine's Day is that it is the holiday dedicated to couples. See, what gets me is that any holiday that becomes Big Business's Commercialized Universal Couple Day  for every single couple in the world is automatically less special. There's no spontaneity at all to that. You know what's even better than Valentine's Day? Your anniversary. Why? Because it's your special day to celebrate being together and not everyone else's also. Plus, you don't have to make reservations months in advance and fight crowds and deal with the price of chocolate skyrocketing (seriously, that's the worst thing ever). Think about that one.
This cake loves me enough to stay with me forever...
right on my thighs.
    Don't get me wrong, I love a holiday that gives me an excuse to eat candy and buy myself another teddy bear to add to my superfluous collection, but please enlighten me on what the big deal is? Even after having the last three Valentine's Days of my life be amazing days full of memories, I still hate it. I guess you could call me cynical, or maybe slightly embittered that I no longer have someone to plan an awesome date for anymore. I'll admit to the latter. Either way, I won't be buying into any of it. Past this blog post, I'm not even going to whine about being alone on Valentine's Day. Instead I'm going to take this year's Valentine's Day with a grain of salt and do something nice for myself. I'm going to call my family and wish them a happy Valentine's Day and tell them I love them, and then spoil myself rotten. I'm keeping away from Facebook that day with the exception of a facetious "I think today is stupid" post or two because I don't care to expose myself to everyone's nauseating "Happy Valentine's day, honey!" posts all day ad nauseam. I feel it's toxic to my emotional well-being this early in the game. As far as Valentine's Day is concerned, it will just be another ordinary day to eat chocolate.