Tuesday, February 14, 2012

The Valentine's Day Dilemma.

someecards
[Cosmocking is coming next!  They take a long time to write.  I'll have it up late today or sometime tomorrow.]

I have a dilemma every time I’m in a relationship when this day rolls around.

Part of me thinks: “This is a commercialized, manufactured holiday that celebrates oppressively inflexible gender roles, shames men who don't give the perfect gift and women who don't get the perfect gift, marginalizes queer people, marginalizes the shit of single people and people in closeted relationships, and ought to be completely unnecessary in a relationship where we express our love when and how we feel it rather than the way The Man tells us to. This holiday sucks and as someone who cares about conscious and intentional relationships, I should have no goddamn part of it.”

But a smaller yet deeper part of me feels sad about those words, because they're words that come from a sexual and romantic rebel, yes, but they're also words that come from a Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything. (I have battled often with the Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything inside me, desperately resisting her threats that I'm just one "can we go out somewhere nice tonight?" away from morphing into the High-Maintenance Girlfriend Who Wants Everything.)  That part of me wants to put my foot down and say “I know this is arbitrary, Rowdy*, but sometimes I need you to make small arbitrary gestures to prove you care about me even when I don't make sense.”

Also, Valentine's Day sometimes feels like a one-day hyper-concentration of the "you poor dear, guess he doesn't love you that much" messages I get from the mainstream culture over the facts that we're not monogamous and not planning to get married or have kids.  It's not that I even want any of those things, but the relentless message of "non-traditional relationships are no way to treat a lady!" still seeps through to my sad little insecure place sometimes.  Celebrating Valentine's Day like giant saps is a relatively safe, cheap way to soothe that little sad place.  Or maybe it's a way to say screw you, society, see how our non-traditional love can be totally sappy.

I don’t want diamonds and I don’t want to receive without giving, but I think exchanging goofy heart candies** for goofy reasons is an opportunity to say “You know what? Sometimes validating feelings is more important than always fighting the good fight.”


This year, we’ve agreed to exchange presents on the 16th. That way we get to take advantage of day-after sales and uncrowded restaurants and feel like we’re getting something over on The Man, while still satisfying my irrational need to occasionally be allowed to have an irrational need.



*Rowdy is actually really good about validating things like "I need you to be here for me and I can't coherently explain why." This post is about my own tangled insecurities, not about him trying to convince me not to want anything. If anything, I think he gets upset when my Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything self-enforcement goes into overdrive.  
Captain Awkward has a great post here on related issues, on why we pressure ourselves into pretending we never need anything from our friends and lovers, and why good friends and lovers don't actually want us to do that.


**But not Conversation Hearts. They're great cultural touchstones for representing the holiday and all, but they taste like chalk.

55 comments:

  1. I mostly love this holiday. I adore all the candy in heart shaped boxes and silly stuffed animals. Of course, I might be biased by the fact that I never had to celebrate this holiday as a couple.

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  2. My relationship with Valentine's Day is the same relationship I have with kink and BDSM: yeah sure when it's not done right it can fuck lots of people over, and it relies on a bunch of damaging social rules and gender/sex/relationship policing to technically exist, even if it's being turned on its head, but I'm at the point where I can say Fuck The System by doing the very thing it embodies on my own goddamn terms and screw anyone who thinks we're shortchanging ourselves because of it.

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  3. Conversation hearts are delicious.

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    1. Tums are delicious!

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    2. Tums totally taste better than conversation hearts. The only reason they exist is so that someone can feel they're being romantic when really they only want to spend $1.25.

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    3. SweeTarts makes delicious conversation hearts that are SOUR. SOUR CONVERSATION HEARTS. They revived my relationship with conversation hearts forever.

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  4. You're not the only one who struggles with being the Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything. I try so hard not to nag or demand things or be the Evil High Maintenance Girlfriend Who Wants Everything, which means I sometimes just can't get my boyfriend to spend time with me or pay attention to me. It's hard asking for things without looking like some horrible self-entitled princess.

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  5. Uhg, I fight with my inner Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything too! I'm getting a lot better about it, I think, but I also often feel like I'm just one "please just stay in with me tonight I'm too stressed to handle groups of people" away from Being Needy, which I'm pretty sure would mean the end of the universe.

    As far as Valentine's Day in particular...for me it's kinda like Christmas. Yes, there is a lot of messed up commercialization and social expectations about How People Act If They Care, but as someone with a stressful, busy life, it's nice to have a "slow down and do something nice together" reminder. Also, I very much like the idea of co-opting it as a force for good - on of my roommates, for example, left little bags of candy on everyone's doors, and my boss got me a nice card. So I'm all about embracing Valentine's day not as a Spend Lots of Money To Prove Affection Day, but as a Remember the Small Gestures That Make People Feel Good kind of day.

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  6. XKCD encompassed this pretty brilliantly this year: http://xkcd.com/1016/

    My partner and I are celebrating on Sunday because it is the first day we'll have off from work together and it is also the day that we met at a party one year ago. My favorite restaurant does this amazing Happy Hour where you can get tipsy and full on delicious food for like $30 so we are going to hit that up.

    Also, I totally agree with you on the PGWNWA thing. Especially since I dated several men who heavily reinforced the fact that wanting things (like, say, spending time together that DIDN'T involve watching him play Halo for 5 hours before going to sleep) made me THE MOST EVIL SHE-BEAST COMING TO STEAL HIS PRECIOUS TIME AND THINGS. Le sigh. But things are much, much, better now!

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    1. I got you Easter candy and a bag of hammers!

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  7. But a smaller yet deeper part of me feels sad about those words, because they're words that come from a sexual and romantic rebel, yes, but they're also words that come from a Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything. (I have battled often with the Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything inside me, desperately resisting her threats that I'm just one "can we go out somewhere nice tonight?" away from morphing into the High-Maintenance Girlfriend Who Wants Everything.) That part of me wants to put my foot down and say “I know this is arbitrary, Rowdy*, but sometimes I need you to make small arbitrary gestures to prove you care about me even when I don't make sense.” Well said. I recognize this in myself quite often, but you put it into a concrete couple of sentences that a) makes sense, b) expresses something that I realize is NOT just "me being weird", and c) gives me a script to address it with. Thank you! :)

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  8. On the one hand, Valentine's Day is an over-blown commercial holiday which only exists so Hallmark can sell cards.

    On the other hand, I really, really, REALLY have a hard time saying that we shouldn't be setting aside a day to tell our loved ones that we care about them.

    Regardless of how we started it, a day to celebrate "love" instead of a day to celebrate "hey let's threaten to break each other's jaws because we don't like what the other has to say" sounds like a ridiculously good plan.

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  9. Holly, do you sometimes get the feeling that the Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything serves to please men in a problematic way?
    I was just getting this feeling from some posts I've seen of women (in heterosexual relationships) who say things like "Fuck Valentine's Day! It's stupid!" with a tone of I'm-such-a-great-girlfriend or as if women who WANT things on Valentine's Day are lesser than them. It just seems borderline female chauvinism.
    There's something that bothers me about this, but I can't quite articulate it, so if you (or anybody else) has thoughts, I'd like to hear them.

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    1. Absolutely, and that's a big part of the reason it makes me so uncomfortable.

      Looking down on other women for being "needy" is looking down on other women for having needs, and hell yes that is problematic. The narrative of the Perfectly Independent Girlfriend is in many ways just a 21st-century tough-girl re-imagining of the very old narrative of the Girlfriend Who Knows Her Place.

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    2. I struggle with this, because I go through that whole thought process of why Valentine's Day is awful, and I'm sure there are plenty of people who partake in the pink chocolate heart bacchanal without thinking about these things.

      It just seems people and some women themselves are very quick to blame women for it all, and that's what I take issue with.

      The whole Perfectly Independent Girlfriend thing is such an oxymoron, because why the hell would she be with anybody if she didn't have needs or wants from her partner?

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    3. I think where I draw the line is: It's okay for a woman to not celebrate Valentine's Day. And it's okay for her to be very independent and not need much from her boyfriend.

      What's not okay is presenting these things as virtues, and as gendered virtues. It's not okay to say "I don't care about Valentine's Day because that's stupid girl stuff." It's not okay to say "I don't need my boyfriend because men shouldn't have to deal with stupid girl issues." That's when this stuff turns chauvinist.

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    4. I don't know, I think the narrative of the "needy" girlfriend is problematic. For one thing it implies women always have needs whereas men never do. Not to mention it implies that in a relationship one person should always take and one should always give with no reciprocity involved. I don't see that as being fair. Personally I'm bothered by narratives that make gender the basis on how someone should act in a relationship and not reciprocity.

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  10. Thank you so much for this, Holly! Brilliant post once again and puts into words so many of the things I've been thinking about today.

    This is the first Valentine's day I haven't celebrated since I was 14 years old - I only broke up with my long term partner last year, and my partner now A) doesn't believe in Valentines and B) celebrates something completely unrelated with his other partner today.

    It's been difficult, and I've been struggling to acknowledge that.... particularly with a Facebook news-feed full of people going on about all the romantic things their partners have done for them today. I *know* Valentine's day is a hugely over-commercialised false holiday, but I still miss having someone making a bit of a fuss of me and making me feel loved. And I feel like I shouldn't express that, because it comes across as being needy/demanding/High Maintenance Girl Who Wants Everything.

    So, in the absence of any better option right now, I am fending off the loneliness by having a taking-care-of-the-Jess day where I just look after myself.

    I wrote a blog post about it, too: http://loveisinfinite.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/poly-on-valentines-day/

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  11. oh man yes! re: perfect girlfriend who never wants anything. sometimes i have to be like "hey, self, it's okay to need things! also okay to want things! you're allowed to ask your boyfriend for things you want and need!"

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  12. Here here! I also spent years in relationships based around "No no, I don't need those frivolous, stereotypical-girl things! I want only practical things or things you think I should want, sweetie." I struggle with it as well, because of course you get so much guy-validation on this! Not even just from guys that one is dating, but one's circle of friends who think you're a "cool chick" for not doing all those 'chick things guys hate' such as liking jewelry or talking about feelings or (or feminism, har) or whatever. Sure, you might have the greater culture giving you those "your relationship is defined by material displays! by tolerating how opposite species you are!" but you've already rejected that.

    (Planning a wedding with this thought process has been... interesting.)

    Personally, I had some sad events happen near Valentines so I don't mind working or otherwise being very low-key. We're having a simple, nice dinner at home.

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  13. When any date that is socially pressured to be romantic rolls around (anniversary, V-Day, I can't think of a third example, etc), I think about what I want it to look like and then tell my partner. He is very sweet and calm, and he likes to know what I want so he can participate with me. For example: This year, I wanted a romantic dinner and walk in the park, followed by mutual exchanging of lingerie (the man looks good in lacy panties, what can I say?). So I organized the reservations, directed him to Victoria's Secret, and also checked in with him that this was all okay. We had a wonderful time (no, we are not time-travelers, we just celebrated it yesterday because it was my day off), and I am happy that I got exactly what I wanted without having to give Cosmo eyelash fluttering Morse code to tell him without actually talking.

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    1. That's awesome. I love hearing stories about times when explicit communication really works for people.

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    2. It worked for me this year. I am having huge conflict because I am in a closeted relationship and my jerkbrain is telling me "well people just shouldn't have closeted relationships and then they wouldn't have these problems". And yet I really wanted to to V day anyway. So I told my sweetie that it was important to me to do something mushy, I mean full on middle-school-two-halves-of-a-heart-pendants-that-we-each-wear mushy. As it turns out he quite wanted to do a love poetry, bear-holding-a-heart-with-roses-and-a-treacly-phrase-on-a-box-of-bon-bons thing himself. So we are doing a late festival of half price chocolate and silliness and overblown yet sincere declarations of adoration.

      This is going far to relieve my discomfort about having a stealth love affair. We are having it for a rather silly reason; his mother wouldn't approve. I am much older and she thinks I would be taking advantage of(read almost molesting)him. At twenty four years old I think this is silly, I am in no position of authority relative to him in any way and never have been. He seduced me I didn't go after him. Wow, I really sound defensive. I have never have a lover I couldn't freely admit to. Can I get a reality check on whether it really is skeezy to fall in love with a 24 year old?

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    3. Anon - According to the ol' "half plus seven" rule, you're all clear to date a 24-year-old as long as you're under 34.

      Realistically, 24 is way too old to raise any "taking advantage of an innocent little thing" concerns so I'd say mazel tov regardless.

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    4. Thanks! LOL at the rule though, 10 years isn't that much older, I am closer to 44 than 34.

      Thank you for all of your communication posts. We have been doing very well with it partly due to them:)

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  14. My Valentine's Day dilemma was less of "Do I want to participate in the sappy part of this day", and more of "I don't feel like dressing up in lingerie, I don't feel like having sex tonight, I don't feel sexy tonight, but I will feel like a shitty girlfriend if I don't."

    Exchanging of gifts is more readily accepted as something both sides can do, and can ask for, without being needy, but when it comes to the sex, I feel that it's all up to me, and he has to do nothing but lay back and take it. I have my problems with Perfect Girlfriend Who Never Wants Anything too, but my problem yesterday was less with that and more with Perfect Girlfriend Who Wants Sex At All The Right Times.

    As it was, we didn't have sex, I felt like a shitty girlfriend, then went home and cried myself to sleep.

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    1. I know (or at least hope) that you already know this, but not having sex because you don't feel like having sex does not make you a shitty girlfriend, and hopefully he understands that as well. :)

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    2. I recently struggled with that too. My partner is in the military so we don't get to see each other very often. He was recently on leave, and one of the nights I really didn't feel like having sex. I was struggling with that because hey, I never get to see him so right now I should be having as much sex as humanly possible, right? I ended up bursting into tears and telling him what I was feeling. He told me not to feel guilty about wanting or not wanting things, especially sex.

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  15. "Today is an important day! And do you know why? Why, today is the day that Captain Cook was stabbed to death by a Hawaiian chef.

    In honour of this, we're going to kidnap some islanders. Get your coat."

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    1. Cook was killed by a chef? I suppose that's appropriate.

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    2. ...Cook was killed by a chief. And he was killed because he was trying to kidnap the king of Hawai'i, so, might want to rethink that kidnapping plan.

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    3. Oh King Kamehameha. You are the reason I will never be able to watch that anime because WHY ARE THEY SCREAMING THE NAME OF THE LAST KING OF HAWAII?

      What really makes me feel bad for the guy is that probably more people know his name through THAT than who the hell he WAS.

      --Rogan

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  16. What I love about my girlfriend is that she is really good at telling me what she wants or expressing her feelings about something in a calm, gentle manner that makes it nearly impossible for me not to understand, empathize and really want to meet her needs in whatever way I can. She's the first partner I've had that can do that.

    And for the record, the people in my life who are really bad at expressing their needs don't remain super important to me for long, because a good part of the joy in any kind of relationship is being able to be there for someone. Not to say I actively have problems with them, but it's hard to put energy into such people.

    Maybe not everyone feels that way, but as long as I'm getting my needs met, too, then it seems likely that I will happily want to meet another person's needs.

    And I don't know what this might imply about my feelings on Valentine's Day, but I'm giving my girlfriend a gift that it's hard to find the time for:

    buttsex!

    And I should say, as per your post on this topic, I actually don't get as much out of it as she does (insane, screaming orgasms for her, barely being able to come for me) so it really isn't a self-indulgent gift, except that I love giving people insane screaming orgasms :)

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    1. I just want you to know I nearly spit my tea all over my laptop when I got to: 'buttsex!'

      Totally did not expect that, hahaha.

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  17. I love Valentine's Day, even though I really haven't ever had a significant other to celebrate with. I see it as a celebration of love, much like how Halloween is a celebration of death and St. Patrick's Day is a celebration of drinking until you vomit. The "Valentine's Day is just a commercial holiday used to sell cards" counter-culture is as much a thing as celebrating the actual day is now, and it's hard to rebel against something that so few people choose to enjoy anymore. The cynicism against it just kinda breaks my heart. Usually I draw up and print out my own cards or bake my own sweets and hand them out to my friends with personalized messages, or I'll invite them out on a big friend date to a restaurant we all like, because I see it as much a celebration of romantic love as platonic love, or familial love. (It's also my way to get around the commercialization of the whole thing - why buy some crummy, half-baked card when you can just mass produce your own?) I think it should be okay to pick one day and make it a special tribute to a big part of our lives, just for funsies. It's a holiday to do all that special fun sappy crap, because we can't afford it or spend time doing it all year long. I mean, technically you could dress as Batman every day, but you save it for Halloween because it's special (and it makes a good excuse so you don't get weird looks). But of course, no one should feel pressured to act a certain way, any day of the year. If love is eating potato chips and watching The Real Housewives with your dog, knock yourself out. I just hate it when people put down those that want to celebrate because they enjoy it, not because it's an obligation.

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  18. Aaaaand that's another reason I love being queer. Most of the "THIS IS WHAT YOU SHOULD DO ON VALENTINE'S DAY" flies right past me, simply because it's not directed at me.

    Today on the actual Valentine's day, I am working on writing a short story for my partner (she loves my writing). And in the ultimate in loving partner consideration, I am staying away from her: I think I'm getting sick :/.

    Sure, it sucks that I can't get flowers sent to my work from her (because that would invite awkward questions), and we can't jump into any Facebook mushiness (because it's too public), but we make do. We are happily out to our immediate family and close friends who all accept us, and that more than makes up for it.

    It sounds corny, but being "secretly" in love has given those other important people in my life so many chances to show how much they love me. I am so lucky :).

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  19. I hate the "Valentine's Day is just an excuse for Hallmark to sell stuff, so I'm not going to do anything romantic!" attitude, which is too often a cover for never doing anything romantic ever.

    There are a million and one loving gestures you can do for your sweetheart (a heartfelt letter or poem is first on the list for me, with massage exchange a close second) that don't involve spending any money whatsoever. There are also a million ways you can take time to tell EVERYONE you love what they mean to you, single, coupled, straight, old, young, queer, mono, poly, whatever. I don't really grok all the angst about having a socially-set-aside day to celebrate love. If you've been doing love different up until Valentine's Day, why would you have to suddenly conform now?

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  20. I don't think valentine's day marginalizes queer people, any more than advertising does any other day of the year. My office has a good number of queer people in it and we all talked about what we were going to do for valentine's day in the same way. We're not particularly off the mainstream cultural grid, either - I hear enough American Idol recaps that I feel like I watch the show myself.

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  21. My problem with valentine's day is that it is just too over commercialised. And I've never been in a relationship near it so I've never had the opportunity to actually celebrate it. I changed it up this year. And this year was my best valentine's day ever. Then again I also don't celebrate it. I feel no need to celebrate a holiday whose patron saint was castrated, tortured, and eventually killed for going against the church.(*takes off her history nerd glasses*) I got a good friend of mine and the guy that if we lived closer to each other we'd be in a relationship with each other onto a skype call with me and we all sat and talked and laughed and sang and played different video games together despite the fact I'm over 5k miles from them and they're closer to each other than I am.

    I'm also one of those people that feel valentine's day is one of those days that can "excuse" an abuser. Because basically what I feel it says is that "you can treat your partner like shite the rest of the year but this day you have to treat them nicely and show them how much you love them." And it gives victims who are either in denial about the abuse or in a position where they feel they can't do anything about it to be something like "well yeah they hit me yesterday but today they took me out for a nice dinner and got me this and that and this proves that they really love me." Which personally, feels like a dangerous relationship if you're saying that. And a dangerous mindset. I've unfortunately had friends in similar situations. My belief is that if you love someone no matter to what degree - friendship, relationship, extreme like but not quite love, etc - you shouldn't just set aside one day where you tell them/show them/make them feel it. It should be consistent. The smallest gestures can mean the world to me. Heck, the boys talking to me today pulled me out of my usual day to day depression enough that I could clear my head for a few hours and get a few things that were more important straightened out (like my job hunting tomorrow) and that, in itself, meant more to me than if I had been given flowers and taken out to dinner. But then again, my mum kind of raised me with that mindset. So it might just be that I believe that just from how I was raised.

    Also, kudos to linking the Captain Awkward article. I read that when it got posted and bookmarked it because I couldn't say it better. And I have friends like that. I have friends halfway across the world that if I need it will give up the sleep they need just to listen to me if I really need it.

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  22. Valentine's Day: Because No One Is Allowed To Be Really Happy.

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  23. I have had a boyfriend handy for exactly one Valentine's Day in my entire life. For me, it's always been "that day when my parents ruin my healthy diet by purchasing chocolate for me in a cutesy heart-shaped box."

    My mom pushed me into going on a low-carb diet 2 weeks ago, and then she ordered chocolate-covered strawberries for me.

    Oh well, I'm going to see what dark-chocolate varieties are on sale. :3 Dark satisfies my chocolatey cravings without me having to eat as much.

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  24. I feel kinda weird that V-Day has never struck me like this. I feel like a lot of it just... went over my head. Like sure it existed, but it brings me WAY less blues than say, Christmas. (Oh god Christmas... WHY DO YOU EXIST CHRISTMAS GO AWAY.) Maybe it's 'cause I'm mostly ace or something?

    Also, my husband always has it rough that day, so it's less "do romantic stuff" day and more "hug and cuddle through the grief" day. Plus, today was "pack and clean all the things" day, since we're leaving town today for a week.

    Between all the sweeping, laundering, packing, and stuff, the only really V-Day thing we managed to do was listen to John Prine and grab dinner together, have strawberry/chocolate pancakes. To be fair, they were freaking awesome pancakes.

    As far as "irrational need to have an irrational need..." I don't feel that for romance, but boy howdy do I feel that for other shit. (Spend time with me! Reassure me! Hug me!) I'm more the guy who FORGETS the romantic gestures and needs to be prompted. *wince*

    --Rogan

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  25. This Valentine's was the very first I've ever had a partner for, so I enjoyed being able to 'celebrate' it, for once. It's not nearly as big of a deal in Norway as in the US, but it's still there.

    We didn't do anything fancy; I'd let him know that I'd love to get flowers and chocolate, since I've never received that before, but he needn't go overboard or anything. I knit him a cool hat and got him chocolates too. We had a quiet evening in and it was lovely. =)

    I don't care about the day all that much, but I appreciate any chance for a celebration, and I love giving presents almost as much as I like receiving them. Throw in a little romance and I'm sold. My only regret is that I forgot to put on our song. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiXaT_1I-vw)

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  26. I spent most of Valentine's Day holding my partner's hand while the doctors poked and prodded and drew still more blood and decided that he has rheumatoid arthritis. And then we went out to sushi, because the meds are going to make him pretty sick.

    On consideration, a cute little romantic gesture might be a good thing sometime today or tomorrow. It'll go over better if it's not on the 14th. I don't know quite what to get him, though. Food might catch him when he's nauseated. Maybe I'll get him a couple of D&D figurines.

    Do I have a point? I'm not sure I do, except that we ought to feel free to tailor the holidays to our own relationships rather than having them be a straitjacket we have to either conform to or escape from.

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  27. I really hate some parts of Valentine's day, because I feel like there are all these gendered 'romantic' things that you're SUPPOSED to appreciate - if my boyfriend bought me red roses, and I really don't like red roses and it didn't take him any thought at all, is it still a gesture of love? [I had a relationship in high school that was a lot of that... a lot of, "I know this is what girls are supposed to like but I really don't but thanks anyway because its supposed to be nice?" so I really HATED V-Day then].

    My current boy feels much the same way I do about the holiday [that xkcd linked above is a pretty perfect encapsulation of that], so he took advantage of a pre-Valentine's sale to buy me some nipple clamps.

    As far as I'm concerned, "I accept your kinks and want to explore them with you" is about as perfectly romantic as you can get.

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  28. Maybe one of your love languages is receiving gifts. Valentine's day probably just talks to you. ;)

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  29. I think my only problem with Valentine's Day is the people who take it seriously... on both sides. Both the "HE DOESN'T LOVE ME IF HE DOESN'T GIVE/DO THE PERFECTEST SURPRISE EVER" and "Valentine's Day is a a commercial piece of crap and if you do anything you're giving in to the man."

    It's a day to celebrate. So chill out! Communicate with your significant other about what would be special for you. Or with your friend. Or have a night to yourself. Just relax and do something you enjoy (even if it's a stereotypical romantic dinner or ignoring it entirely). Just don't make such a big stressed out deal over it.

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  30. There is no reason why this should be a commercialized, manufactured holiday! My honey and I made each other a big steak dinner, which we ate on an overturned box because he has no furniture, and then we had chocolate because chocolate goes well with steak, cuddled on the floor because cuddling goes well with everything, and he played video games while I slept on his legs. If I didn't have him, I would have gone the fuck to the library. Honestly. It's a really laid-back holiday if you just give in and enjoy it.

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  31. There's nothing anti-feminist about celebrating our love (whether platonic or romantic) for the people in our lives. I invite all of my friends over for a dinner every year the day before valentines day (because if you are part of a couple celebrating vday with your honey is not something I want to interfere with) for a huge dinner every year. We watch sappy movies that celebrate friendship, eat really good food, and share so much love with one another.

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  32. Incidentally, message hearts no longer taste like chalk. They now taste like generic artificial candy. Personally I wish they would bring the tradition chalk flavor back.

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  33. My partner got me a book called "That's Revolting! Queer Strategies for Resisting Assimilation" as a Valentine's Day gift - the first essay was a radical queer critique of the entire institution of marriage. I am going to go ahead and call it the best Valentine's gift I've ever received.

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  34. i've always had problems with Valentine's day, because my birthday is Feb 12. if i want to do VDay, i'm "needy" or "greedy", but if i don't, i'm "not allowing people to show me love" and "placing ideals over people".


    meanwhile... my boyfriend and i have been together almost 8 years. in that time, i've become progressively more disabled, and he already has to do a lot for me, so i feel HORRIBLE asking him to do anything for VDay. or wanting to do anything. because he already "does so much"
    except that isn't true - he sometimes gets me drinks or food, sometimes takes me to appointments. he doesn't wait on me hand-and-foot, and i KNOW it's the cultural conditioning making me feel GUILTY at asking my partner, the man who loves me, to get me something to drink because i hurt too much to get off the bed. so i get told - by the same people, mind - that it's "proof" that he loves me when he gets me a drink, that i'm "needy and demanding", that it's proof he DOESN'T love me when he doesn't get me a separate gift for VDay because we're poor, and that i should be more demanding about getting a gift. seriously - "he loves you but he doesn't love you" and "you're too demanding but not demanding enough" are messages i could stop hearing any. fucking. day now.

    i don't have a point either, i guess. just rambling.

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  35. My birthday is on the sixteenth and I couldn't think of a better birthday present than all different types of people in all different types of relationships celebrating them any way they want. :)

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