Obligatory V-day post

Valentine's Day has traditionally been one of my least favorite holidays because everytime I had a boyfriend and thought I might get to celebrate it with someone other than my mom, he managed to break up with me beforehand, then somehow convince me to get back together afterwards. Thankfully, I've been able to celebrate with the same sweetie for four years now, so my view of this day has greatly improved.

In honor of this day, I thought I would share some of the history of V-day (thank you History Channel):

One legend says that Valentine's Day was created by the Catholic church in response to the Romans' naughty ways. The Romans would have a festival where members of the Luperci, an order of Roman priests, would gather at the 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 then sacrifice a goat, for fertility, and a dog, for purification.

The boys would then slice the goat's hide into strips, dip them in the sacrificial blood and take to the streets, slapping both women and fields of crops with the goathide strips. Roman women apparently liked this because it was believed the strips would make them more fertile in the coming year. Later in the day, all the young women in the city would place their names in a big urn. The city's bachelors would then each choose a name out of the urn and become paired for the year with his chosen woman. These matches often ended in marriage. Pope Gelasius declared February 14 St. Valentine's Day around 498 A.D. The Roman 'lottery' system for romantic pairing was deemed un-Christian and outlawed.

Interesting.