valentine's faqs

Q: Why does my wife/girlfriend/mistress get all in my face about Valentine's Day?

A: It's deeply rooted in her genetic material. Especially if she's Italian. In ancient Rome, the festival of Lupercus (the god of fertility) began on February 15 and was considered the beginning of spring and an opportune time for a cleansing. Roman priests would rendez-vous at the cave where Romulus and Remus were said to have been raised by their wolf mother. There, the priests would sacrifice a goat and drain it of its blood. Local kids would chop the goat's hide into strips, dunk them in the sacrificial blood, then run through the city, smacking women with the bloody goat rinds. And the women were into it, since the slapping of bloody goat skin strips was believed to make them more fertile. Clearly. If all she wants is a box of chocolates and/or a string of diamonds, maybe you're getting off lucky?

Q: Fine. But who was Valentine and how can I punish him for this imposition?

A: The historians are a bit unsure. The Catholic Church recognizes three different Valentines, all of whom were martyred. One such example: Back in the third century, again in Rome, Emperor Claudius II had the idea to outlaw marriage, because men with wives and children weren't as good at soldering as the singletons. So! No more marriages for young men! Enter Valentine, a priest at the time who, much like modern day's San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom did for the gays, spit in the face of authority and continued to perform marriages. Unlike California's more restrained highest court, Claudius ordered Valentine be put to death for his actions. Romantic, no?

Q: Martyr, schmartyr. Isn't there ANYONE I can blame?

A: You could try the British. They seem to have imported the tradition of exchanging hand-written valentines, adorned with lace and all the trimmings, in the 19th century. Or Esther Howland of Worcester, Mass., who in 1847 marketed the first mass-produced greetings cards. A graduate of Mount Holyoke College, Howland is recognized by the industry association as a "Greeting Card Visionary." Truly. But she's dead now, too.

Q: So isn't it just a bogus commercial ploy?

A: You bet. Today, we exchange a billion valentines worldwide (85 percent of which are purchased by women) and use it as an excuse to eat candy. As an aside, we've been falling down on this front: In 1997, American per capita consumption of candy was 27 pounds; in 2004, it sank to 4.7. This, in my view, is a sad state of affairs.

Anyway, it could be worse: Consider the situation in Korea and Japan, where women are socially obligated to give chocolates to all of the men in their office. "By a further marketing effort," Wikipedia explains, "a reciprocal day called White Day has emerged. On this day (March 14), men are supposed to return the favor by giving something to those who gave them chocolates on Valentine's Day. Many men, however, give only to their girlfriends. Originally the return gift was supposed to be white chocolate or marshmallows (hence the name 'White Day'). However, more recently men have taken the name to a different meaning, thus lingerie is quite a common gift." And we all know who the lingerie is really for... Typical. And does anyone find it suspicious that the men do this a full month after getting their valentines? Did this holiday evolve out of years of forgetting to get their ladies a box of chocolates--so much so that the men's industry created a holiday to validate their lateness? Harumph.

Happy valentine's to one and all.