I love Valentine's Day. Well. There are very few holidays that I don't love (Martin Luther King Day, for example, tempts me with the idea that I might get a day off, and then does not deliver. Plus there are no special festive traditional MLK-day foods, games, or hats. It doesn't have to be that way, kids. Let's think of something that will make MLK day the greatest holiday ever!!)

But Valentine's Day. What is good about it? Let me tell you:

1. You get to wear a color combination that would otherwise considered hideous.
2. You get to draw little hearts all over your day planner
3. You get to eat little heart candies that practically break your teeth... it's like eating 50 abbreviated fortune cookies, and everyone likes fortune cookies!
4. Usually it is snowing. What is more romantic than snow? Ans: NOTHING!
5. You get to see boys walking around awkwardly with flowers. cute!
6. You get to dye all of your food pink! (though dyeing it green for St. Patrick's Day is definitely cooler)
7. Sudden availability of chocolate! (Reese's hearts, for example!)
8. Sometimes you get a flower from your daddy and then you can draw it three times over: once when you get it, once when it opens to its fullest glory, and once when with weeping, wilted head it lets fall its petals to the table.

Today in my Valentinesy rapture I thought with fond remembrance on where I was and what I was doing for the past four Valentine's Days.

Freshman year it was a Friday night and all of us in our hall were hanging around as usual. We shut all of the boys (excepting Ranor and at times, Dan), and we made Valentines for all of the boys in our hall. This consisted of cutting out pictures from the Victoria's Secret magazine and pasting them onto pieces of construction paper and decorating them and putting suggestive phrases in speech bubbles above the models' heads. Once that was finished, the night was still young, so we proceeded to turn the lounge into... THE FEISTY FLAMINGO: a nightclub for exotic Valentine's Day dancers. Unfortunately we had no exotic dancers, and no pole, only a stray hurdle that we had taken from the pile of old unused hurdles by the track. So we made up names for all of the girls in the hall like, "Luscious Linh" and "Curvy Kristi" and "The DomiNika". Ranor tried to teach us how to hurdle dance, among other things. It was awesome. While the lounge is now just another dorm room, the Feisty Flamingo will live on.

Sophomore year it was a Saturday and my mom was in town. We went out into the village and looked around and went to this awesome place kind of like BeadIt! where you could make a necklace for yourself. That was awesome. The weather was splendid and it was California, so all the flowers were in bloom. You know, I was thinking about it, and perhaps men once gave flowers to women on Valentine's Day because it would be pretty freakin' hard to get a flower in the middle of winter, and it probably meant that you went to some great trouble to procure it. But now all you have to do is get on the internet. This doesn't make flowers any less awesome, of course. But if you lived in SoCal, you could just go pick her some flowers (how totally romantic is that!?). When I lived there, I wanted to pick flowers all the time, but I felt bad because somebody was tending those flowers, so instead I would choose the nicest flower I could find that had already fallen off the tree or bush, and I'd take that one home and draw it.

Junior year I was in China. In fact that was the day on which Phil and I and company drifted down the river Li from Guilin to Yangshuo. While it had absolutely none of the trappings of your average Valentine's Day, it will probably always remain among the most memorable. Especially when Steven drank Snake Wine, which looks like all outward appearances like formaldehyde, as it has actual snake-bodies in it.

Senior year it fell on a Monday, and I was busy as all hell. I got back to my room late at night and I had a little gift on my desk, someone had bought me an acre of Mars from the internet. It came complete with a land deed and a map of Mars showing where your acre was on the planet (mine was on the flank of Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the solar system!). My mouth watered with thoughts of that rich, fertile volcanic soil. ;P It was from my "secret admirer". Later that evening my secret admirer was revealed. Hilarity ensued.
Just kidding.

Then my friend Kristina and I got all of the tea lights we could find and made a little trail of candles from the steps of our rooms to our doors (which were right across from each other's) and up to our respective roommates' desks. We also put my carnations to good deaths by pulling out all of their petals and sprinkling them romantically on the floor. The wax was on the carpet for the rest of the semester. One of our suitemates gave each of us this gigantic pair of chocolate lips, and those were soooo good.
Incidentally, my "secret admirer" will spend this Valentine's Day in Guilin, China. No way, right, how crazy is that? Now all I need is for my mom to become part of the cast at the Old Feisty Flamingo, and all the Valentine's Day cosmic connections will be complete. But I don't think that's going to happen. ;)

Land on Mars?
That's quite the investment. I remember seeing that documentary "Mission to Mars" about the intelligent life on Mars. Apparently, it has yet to be introduced to any of our modern conveniences. There should be a vast, unexploited market for earth goods and services just waiting to be tapped on the surface of the Red Planet.

You could use that land to build the only mall complex or movie cineplex within 100 lightyears and make a fortune. Of course, I would get part of the cut...
» ManOfDarkSunglasses on 2007-01-22 09:31:29

i see.
sure, go ahead. im pleased with it's service.
» middaymoon on 2007-01-22 09:41:38

your entry is entertaining
though i think you spelled "Fiesta" wrong. Or, maybe I did. Is the acre of Mars for real? that's really awesome!
» middaymoon on 2007-01-22 09:59:24

I love how you describe heart candies as mini fortune cookies. :P
» randomjunk on 2007-01-22 10:11:57

I'd love to argue you but
I hate being a party pooper and there's probably a reason why I'm single....
» elessar257 on 2007-01-22 11:29:01

Re: comment
Yeah, I agree with you on the AIDS patients. I say if you are dying of AIDS smoking weed may be the only thing to cheer you up.
» kKaMa67 on 2007-01-22 11:44:20

Allright... You asked for it.

I don't like Valentines Day. I don't hate it. I just really honestly don't like it. This isn't one of those "I'm bitter because I have no one" opinions. I've felt this way for a long time.
When I was younger I had friends from all walks of life. Different as the colors of the rainbow. And I'd often find that many would be heartbroken by this day. Not just in romantic terms, but also in areas of friendship or homelife. It would break my heart that so many people would walk around feeling at their worst while others would openly express their love.

It's a tricky thing to try to balance the freedom to express your love and the restraint so as not to become a public attraction. Other people shouldn't be punished for having those good friends, families, and significant others on such a special day, but I also HATE seeing such good people in pain over it.

So, come this day I act as if nothing is different, because in my mind nothing is. Even during relationships that I've had, I tried to keep it as much on the down-low as possible.

Another thing that bothers me, which is the same thing that bothers me about Thanksgiving, is that it's a designated day. For Valentines it's a designated day to show love. For Thanksgiving it's a designated day to be thankful. Also, come to think of it, like New Years Resolutions.
I do none of the above. Why? Because I try my hardest to make every day all three of those. I try to surprise my loved ones with things as often as my pocketbook allows, and sometimes even when it doesn't. I still manage to scrounge up something simple. I try to be thankful for the people and things I have every day. And I try to make resolutions for myself every day as well.
So what's the point in these Holidays for me? To me it just seems like time to spend more money. The worst part is, if you don't comply, you can and often will be looked at as someone uncaring and heartless for not "joining in on the spirit", which to me, has very little to do with it.


So, those are my thoughts and I'm sticking to them.
» elessar257 on 2007-01-23 01:08:27

5. You get to see boys walking around awkwardly with flowers. cute!
awesome
» ShirleyTemple on 2007-01-23 01:39:09

I know I noted you already....
but I just wanted to say thanks again...I really do appreciate that somebody actually read that insanely long entry...and by the way....there is always hope to salvage martin luther king jr's bday...think of the possibilities...are you thinking of them? now, think of the racially acceptable possibilities...yeah...it does limit the options...but there is hope yet
» Rip-Tide-Prophecy on 2007-01-23 09:40:03

yay
Zanzibar, you're the only other single gal out there who has ever agreed with me that Valentine's day is awesome. I've always been alone in that theory 'till now.

I forget what I've done in years past, but being surrounded by friends, family, friends and an assortment of candy makes the day pass in a relatively welcome haze of pink and purple. I usually give out little things to my friends - or else we go out to eat somewhere, just us girls - but I always try to do something a little extra for the family. It helps that there's just my mom, dad and brother (the guys don't need much).

I agree w/elessar that it's not cool to feel like you HAVE to do something on that day - but at the same time it's nice to feel remembered on that day. I don't know why. Perhaps there's something hypnotic in all those drawn hearts and candy coated...well, everything. In any case - glad I'm not alone.

Maybe we should get our own island and hang out there. lol....
» Helena on 2007-01-23 10:17:26

i partly agree with elessar
OH! i was thinking of the spanish word for party. you're right. i guess yours makes a bit more sense than mine does.
» middaymoon on 2007-01-23 04:50:29

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