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Blue Valentine

By February 15, 2012Depression

I’m not going to try to source the validity of the story I am about to write, so this is the way I choose to define things as I know them.

Today, countless couples are put to the test to publicly display the validity of their relationship status through excessive ProFlowers orders, overpriced dinners, and Hallmark cards where some unknown author writes a seemingly sentimental assembly of words that you could not possibly have so eloquently pulled together yourself. So you whip out your debit card and plunk down your four-plus dollars for a piece of rigid card stock with a matching envelope and hope your online order of overpriced flowers have arrived on time to the person you care about.

Some snotty-ass punk at “your favorite” restaurant reminds you that tonight you will pay triple what you paid that first night to meet that oh-so-special person. Yet, not for one moment will you take a moment to even wonder why you are subjected to all this social humility in the first place.

As I understand it… and again, the above disclaimer applies: This is how I understand Valentine’s Day.

Once upon a time (as all good stories begin), there was an asshole who held the power to send people to war against other people who, in the grand scheme of things, had no interest in killing the perceived opposition. However, the common folk were obligated to fight and give their lives for their “ordained” leader.

If this is sounding very “Supreme Leader of North Korea”… I encourage you to read on. So the “Supreme Leader” hasn’t taken a moment to read Sun Tzu’s Art of War and is getting his ass kicked. He is running out of able bodies and mandates that all “single men” be drafted now to fight over an imaginary line, or some other whim or milestone that he deems worth the lives of another human being.

A God-fearing priest named Valentine sees a loophole. “Single men” are obligated to give their lives to a losing battle—married men are not. Now, as I recall, the story went one of two ways. Either priests were prohibited from marrying new couples, for the greater good of the asshole. OR… it was simply married couples were not obligated to fight this useless war.

So Valentine, in my opinion, does the right thing and begins to sanction and recognize marriages at break-neck speeds, in an effort to preserve the state, church, and humanity on a whole.

The net effect is that the king… the “Supreme Leader”… the Asshole no longer has troops to supply his losing endeavor, and the fighting subsides. Nobody wanted to fight in the first place outside of the “leader” and lo and behold, a relative peace is restored to the land.

The king is outraged and realizes Valentine is the cause for this perceived loss of face. Valentine is burned at the stake in front of thousands of onlookers. Those onlookers, who were likely those saved by Valentine for his courage to marry them and spare their lives, do nothing.

At some point, Valentine’s efforts are recognized, and he is ordained St. Valentine. Irony at its best.

Somewhere along the line, Hallmark gets a hold of this pretty little story, and eventually we’re exchanging little cards with witty little sayings at $4.00 a pop. We are buying $60.00 roses by the dozen, trying to make last-minute reservations for overpriced food. And little multi-colored Tums are sold by the pound with neat little phrases like “Love You” and “Be Mine.”

All the while, Valentine is perpetually burning, while gay people struggle to legally prove their love to the courts and ask simply for a single shred of equality in the eyes of the courts. Single people are meant to feel like lepers for not having a reservation, or that “Every kiss begins with Kay” reason to plop a piece of carbon on somebody’s finger, when in actuality they are just not adding to the Hallmark GDP on this so-very-important day.

Once upon a time, a man stood up for what was right and stopped a war. His name was Father Valentine. While I am not a religious person by any means, this man was, in fact, a saint. He recognized the sanctity of love and protected those who were in it. He respected the importance of life and those who had not yet found love and found a loophole to save as many as he could.

He was burned at the stake for doing so. Tonight, you likely worried more about the details of the perfect date or the fact you didn’t have one.

None of that stuff has anything to do with what today is really about. Today was about celebrating a person who understood the value of life and his dedication to the preservation of it at the cost of his own. It was for true love, by its very definition.