Reclaiming Valentine's Day
January 28, 2020
Did you know Valentine’s Day has origins in the Roman festival of Lupercalia? Along with celebrating the coming of spring, the tradition included various fertility rituals and the “pairing off of women with men by lottery.”
Since then, Valentine’s Day has evolved into a celebration of traditional, romantic love — and although the heart of the holiday has come a long way from its Roman roots, its modern interpretation comes with a lot of complex (and misleading) messaging.
According to pop culture, true love is a house covered in thousands of dollars of rose petals à la Kylie Jenner and Travis Scott, or the #couplegoals-inducing long-term love of power couple Jay Z and Beyoncé. In a time when the average American wedding costs $30,000, it’s easy to conflate love with expensive grand gestures and extreme displays of affection.
Of course, things aren’t always (or even usually) what they seem on social media. Kylie and Travis broke up just two months after his over-the-top floral gesture, and Jay Z was at the center of a very public cheating scandal in 2016. While divorce rates have been on the decline, a large percentage of those expensive weddings don’t end in lifelong matrimony.
With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, let’s take a moment to reclaim the holiday in the name of love — TRUE love — in all its messy, subtle, magical, nuanced, nontraditional, and beautiful forms.
Let's celebrate the dogs that greet us every time we walk through the door, no matter how long we were away. The co-workers who notice our hard work and make sure we get the credit we deserve. Our partners who see us at our worst and still think we’re the best. Our mentors who show us stability in a world that feels inherently unstable.
And, most of all, let's celebrate the love we give ourselves. After all, it's through loving ourselves that we're able to shine our love into others.
Happy Valentine’s Day from all of us at Honeylove. We love you!