When I was a kid, my parents would go to the Valentines Day aisle and hand each other cards in the store. They wouldn’t buy chocolate until the day after which they deemed “Half Priced Chocolate Day.”
Naturally, when I started dating and would see how many people took Valentine’s Day seriously, I felt a bit out of place. It wasn’t until I started dating my current partner, Seth, that I realized other people view the holiday as a waste of time.
Our first Valentine’s Day together, he said, “Happy dumbest-holiday-in-the-world Day.”
Looking back on that, it makes me laugh because we never even talked about our feelings towards February 14. Despite that, he still knew me well enough to know I didn’t want an expensive dinner with roses and sappy cards.
Honestly, that’s what I think is missing from Valentine’s Day celebrations. How many people actually want a bouquet that is going to die and a box of chocolates that cost $15? In new relationships specifically, the holiday is put on a pedestal of having to be perfect.
In my opinion, it misses the mark entirely.
Heres the thing: if your partner is only making that big of an effort one day a year, is it really perfect? I would say no. I actually think it’s a cop-out for being a lazy partner the rest of year.
Save for an anniversary, which is easy to forget, the rest of the year can pass by with the bare minimum effort. So why is February 14 such a big deal?
The answer is simple: it’s a holiday backed by capitalism rather than the love it portrays. Last year, according to the National Retail Federation, Valentines Day spending was expected to total $27.4 million.
According to a survey done by Compare Cards in 2020, men planned on spending $249 and women planned on spending $57.
To me, those numbers show that people care less about the thoughtfulness behind the gifts and more about the amount that is spent on them.
Anytime I bring up my loathing of Valentine’s Day, people accuse me of being bitter because I’m in a bad relationship or because I’m single. Neither of those are true, and as I already stated my partner has a similar distaste for the holiday.
Personally, my Valentine’s Day weekend was perfect. That perfection came in the same display as any other weekend we spend together though: video games, home cooked meals and watching movies while snuggled up on our couch.
But here’s some good news: the fact that I didn’t want roses just meant there were more roses for the people who like receiving them.
