Let's Get Ready to Romance!
The insidious scorekeeping of Valentine's Day. Plus: The Night Circus!
When I was a kid, Valentine’s Day was a competition.
I grew up in the ‘80s, and the ‘80s were cutthroat. Back then, nobody cared if you were inclusive or mean or tolerant or privileged or “woke”. All we cared about was cocaine winning (#ThanksReagan)!
And Valentine’s Day was no different.
Never mind that we were in elementary school and we all thought kissing and romance and all of that was gross; we may not have wanted first base, but we definitely wanted first place. And on February 14th in 198x, that meant collecting more Valentine’s Day cards than everyone else.
Because nothing says romance like VICTORY.
The way it worked, if I remember correctly—and I probably don’t (I was in elementary school in the ‘80s, I’m barely even alive right now)—was that we all made and decorated little mailboxes or pouches in which to collect the Valentine’s Day cards our classmates gave us. Then, at the end of the day or whatever, we opened them up and gathered all the candy and checked to see if we’d gotten a card from Melissa Butanowicz or Amy Tatarka (or whomever your crush was).
Often, they were anonymous, which was even more fun, because not only did you get a piece of candy and a notch on your belt, you got to play detective, and pretending to be a detective is the most fun thing you could do as a kid, other than pretend to be a spy. So much so that we would constantly make up fake scenarios just to search for clues and perform surveillance. (One afternoon, my friend and I staked out our sleepy neighborhood and saw not only a BLUE car drive by but also a RED car as well! WHAT WERE THEY UP TO?!)
Finally, once we’d gone through them all, we counted them to see who got the most.
Despite my good looks and rakish charm, I don’t know that I ever won the “who got the most Valentines” competition, but that didn’t matter. All that really mattered was that I didn’t get the least amount.
To be clear, this isn’t because anyone was looking to get cuffed up back in third grade—despite the more adult trappings of the holiday, little kids weren’t exactly focused on romance—but because if you didn’t get many, or any, Valentine’s Day cards, it was a pretty strong sign that you weren’t popular. And as a kid, that sucked bad.
In fact, the potential implications and subtle bullying of Valentine’s Day’s unequal distribution process were so psychologically damaging that the entire enterprise slowly changed, which is why you just spent all of Tuesday night packing up and signing 30+ Valentine’s Day cards/candies for your kid’s entire class, to ensure that no one is excluded, because love is love.
I’m honestly not sure what’s worse, pitting kids against each other in a Hunger Games-esque battle for the affection of their classmates, or making the entire concept of love meaningless by turning Valentines into participation trophies.
Just kidding, the first one is definitely worse. Obviously. And yet, long past elementary school, we adults are still volunteering as tributes.
I’m not about to push this cynical take on my kids, but while the world has realized that teaching children to express love through gifts isn’t the best idea, it hasn’t stopped adults from following through on it.
Just about every guy has been raised on the idea that he needs to reward his romantic partner with a gift of some kind on February 14th, and it’s ingrained in just about every girl that if he doesn’t do that, maybe he’s just not that into you.
This is nonsense, of course; it takes more than one day—and more than an arbitrary adherence to a calendar—to indicate love (or a lack thereof). But even if your expressions of affection and loyalty and commitment aren’t relegated to Valentine’s Day, the absence of any such expression on Valentine’s Day is still glaring.
Despite the fact schools have abandoned the Valentine’s Days of the ‘80s to spare kids’ feelings and (hopefully?) attempt to disabuse them of the notion that love is about scoring points, most adults continue to play along. So much so that if you don’t, you might make your Valentine feel just as bad as those kids in the 80s who never got a single card.
There’s no easy way out of this.
Valentine’s Day has some religious origins, but its modern day incarnation is as a so-called “Hallmark holiday,” i.e. a date on the calendar that has been artificially propped up into a special occasion by Big Greeting Card and Big Candy and Big Flower. The gambit has been so successful that it has become ingrained in our culture, and good luck to anyone couple’s who don’t abide by it.
It’s nice that elementary school kids are no longer forced to compete for love the way we were oh so many years ago (i.e., when ALF was on TV), but it hasn’t entirely worked. Maybe the next step is for schools to abandon celebrating Valentine’s Day altogether, so we can eventually wipe it off the calendar completely.
Until then, at least we can blame capitalism (#ThanksReagan)!
Social Media Round-up
Pop Culture Stuff
So far this year, I’ve read four books.
The Number Ones, by Tom Breihan, a non-fiction book about 20 songs that have topped the U.S. pop charts over the past 60 or so years, and their impact and reflection of American pop culture. Great, informative, and entertaining book, though my enjoyment sometimes depended on the song/genre that was being explored.
Alias Grace, Margaret Atwood’s fictionalized account of a famous crime in Canada, back in the 19th century. I haven’t read much Atwood besides A Handmaid’s Tale, and while I will try more from her soon, I didn’t love this book. I wasn’t aware of the crime itself, and found the story pretty boring. But I finished it, because I hate not finishing books.
In the Woods, a wildly popular book whose cover I’ve been seeing in strangers’ hands on subway trains for years, about a detective investigating a murder that may have ties to a similar crime from his childhood. It started strong, and I enjoyed it overall, but its initial promise didn’t entirely deliver. It’s the first of a series I probably won’t go back to.
The Night Circus, by Erin Morgenstern, about two young magicians forced into competition by the two older magicians who (separately) raised them and the fantastical circus that serves as their gameboard, of sorts. (The description reminded me of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, though the two books have little in common aside from the magician main characters.) This is one of the best books I’ve read in quite a while. It’s romantic and mysterious and beautifully written and I flat-out loved it. I’m desperate to see a movie (or prestige TV) version, even though I think it’s almost always better to see the movie first YOU HEARD ME.
I’m trying to read at least two books a month all year, so let me know if you have any suggestions! I’m considering something called Wolf in White Van. Or maybe I’ll read Dad Truths next! You definitely should!