Valentine's Day KJ

A sure sign that kids are nearing or have reached teenhood is when they start using words like “chill” when talking to their parents. It actually has a variety of meanings and functions but used in the context of a complaint is close to my generation’s use of the term “KJ” or “kill joy.” As most of us know, KJ refers to a person who is accused of being “anti-fun” or prevents others from having fun. Well, at the risk of reinforcing this emerging refrain from my children, I thought of asking on this very “Day of Hearts” what the fuss is all about.

 Valentine’s Day is reportedly next only to Christmas in popularity in the Philippines. Yet despite its fame, it is paradoxically also one of the most reviled holidays today. Nestled between Christmas and Easter, it involves not the supreme love of a savior, and of His necessary birth and death, but that of courtly and romantic love. More interesting is also the fact that the holiday really traces its roots to a pagan Roman ritual during the Middle Ages that attempted to pair couples using some sort of a lottery system. The Catholic Church tried unsuccessfully for many years to abolish it. In order to finally legitimize the pagan event, the church established the feast of Saint Valentine in 496 AD. Valentine was a martyred priest who was ordered beheaded by Roman Emperor Claudius II for conducting secret marriages. Apart from legitimizing the ritual, however, I doubt if it really changed anything else. And in the centuries that followed, cynics complain that hopeless romantics, and more recently, Hallmark and Godiva, have transformed it to a lame celebration of a shallow and highly commercialized form of love. Indeed, just as many of Cupid’s arrows fly about during the run-up to Valentine’s Day, so are there also as many jaded stabs about its excesses and about the reasons as to why many men and women despise the holiday.

 I don’t know if there is a survey that has actually been made about it, but I do believe that Valentine’s Day is more popular to those who are still in the courting stage or who have just entered into a relationship. At that point, the element of the “chase” is still very much in play and where greeting cards, flowers, chocolates, and jewelry are exciting lures and baits. On the other hand, I think that as couples spend more time with each other, these very same offerings actually become boring. Daily displays of thoughtfulness become more appreciated even when they are as mundane as doing errands or chores for each other, such as remembering to load gas in the car so that your partner wouldn’t have to do so himself or herself. In a deeper sense, I think that it is simple acts such as these that communicate love and affection more effectively (though perhaps more subtly or subconsciously). Besides, chocolates or flowers given unexpectedly with no occasion would likely make more of an impact anyway than doing so on a scheduled event like Valentine’s Day.

Be that as it may, I suppose that after you peel away all the pretensions and colorful gift-wrapping, Valentine’s Day is still, in the end, all about a very primal and basic human reality. Or to recall Julia Roberts’ lines in a cheesy movie whose title I can’t remember anymore, “I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her.” Love it or hate it, there is value or at least some fun and excitement in all of that. So, if you’re ready to take the risk, go for it and ask her! If you’re already with a special someone, get those dozen roses and that chocolate cake. As overpriced as they may be, God knows she deserves it. And finally, for those who are out of love, there is no need for depression, cynicism, or spite. Go watch a romantic movie instead or go to sleep early. Just don’t be a KJ.

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