For too many years, I have hated February 14th. Even only being 19, for some reason I have felt compelled to associate Valentine’s Day with sad single memes and boycott celebrating relationships altogether. I spent the days leading up retweeting and posting about how the only good thing to come out of this cooperate creation of a holiday is the discounted candy at CVS.
But I wasn’t always this pessimistic about this random day in February; I did not used to let it trigger so much hate or sarcasm. I remember the excitement my sisters and I had cutting out hearts and deciding where to put ribbon on each individual valentine we made for every classmate. Each card was made out of love and kindness, celebrating our budding friendships.
When did we stop celebrating love for all of those around us and, instead, focus on one person we might not really love? When did a holiday that used to be pure fun start to cause such loneliness and anger? In a time so fraught with sadness and hate, it is even more important to focus on a day representing love.
I reject my hate for a random day. Since when do we have enough angst and anger to want to take it out on an arbitrary day? Just as I want this world to embrace love, I am going to embrace love. I am going back to when Valentine’s Day meant appreciating everyone around us. Furthermore, I am going to use Valentine’s day as an excuse to be so loving and sappy my friends might just not be able to handle it. I am going to explode with love, because that is what this world needs. Of all times, a day focused on love needs to be celebrated now.
Let’s celebrate it together. Let’s let our love shine down on all those around us and strip Valentine’s Day of all the meaning it had before in our lives and let it instead simply mean a celebration of love.