Say "I Love You" every single day.

Today is one of my least favorite days of the year.  No, I was never hurt, dumped, or forgotten about on Valentines Day. I was never the victim of a prank or attempted murder plot. I hate the insincerity of it.  It is just so fake, so commercialized.  People should be nice every day of the year.  You should tell them you love them all of the time.  I hate that people have come to expect gifts of chocolate, candy hearts, flowers, and cards. I hate that we feel like we need a reason to spoil each other or leave a token of appreciation. On the other end, I hate that any one should feel pressured to provide these things. Not a day goes by that I do not tell my boys that I love them, that they did a good job with something.  Even if I am struggling to appreciate their craziness and out of control behavior, I always find something good.  Anything.  Everyone has something good to offer.  It may be hard to see at first, but search for it.  It is there and you will find it. Maybe we should celebrate Valentines Day every day.  So maybe I don't hate it.  I may actually love it.  I might just not like that we celebrate it only one time a year. We all need to feel loved, all of the time, every day.

While researching the real and true story behind St. Valentine, I came across many tales, some believable, some not.  This one is my favorite.  I found it on http://www.historychannel.com/ 

Origins of Valentine's Day: A Pagan Festival in February

While some believe that Valentine's Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine's death or burial--which probably occurred around A.D. 270--others claim that the Christian church may have decided to place St. Valentine's feast day in the middle of February in an effort to "Christianize" the pagan celebration of Lupercalia. Celebrated at the ides of February, or February 15, Lupercalia was a fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture, as well as to the Roman founders Romulus and Remus.

To begin the festival, members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at a sacred cave where the infants Romulus and Remus, the founders of Rome, were believed to have been cared for by a she-wolf or lupa. The priests would sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification. They would then strip the goat's hide into strips, dip them into the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, gently slapping both women and crop fields with the goat hide. Far from being fearful, Roman women welcomed the touch of the hides because it was believed to make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, according to legend, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would each choose a name and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage.

I have to wonder if any man came and slapped me with a  piece of goat's hide that was freshly dipped into the sacrificial blood, how much I would be telling him I love him. I do however, tell these cute little Valentines of mine that I love them every single day.