Happy Valentines Day

Hi everyone. As you most likely have noticed, I have been offline for a whole week. There is a name for what happened - THE FLU... yup, the creeping-crawling crud. Nothing like wiping you out and kicking you when you are seriously down. Last week was spent dragging myself from one day to the next, with loads of sleeping in between. The good news is that I lost a bunch of weight, not because I couldn't keep food down, but because I was too tired to want to eat anything. This week is a little better, but am still getting really tired fast. It is because I don't want to leave you guys abandoned that I refuse to go to bed right now and wanted to post a quick blog...

Don't get the Flu...get a flu shot...you are not indestructible... trust me, been there...done that... Anyway, on to more fun stuff.

Today is Valentines Day. How many of you are actually aware of the origins of Valentine's Day? Well, tonight, your weekly trivia is on the origins of Valentine's Day...

To put it succinctly, nobody REALLY knows the true origins of Valentine's Day. There...blog done... well, not really. Bet you want to know just a tad more...

Some people may believe that Valentine's Day was based on something romantic that Saint Valentine did...but in actuality, it appears that one of the Saint Valentines (there were at least 3) was sort of a romantic, he married couples even when there was an edict against any and all marriages...

Let's start somewhat at the beginning...pre-Christian... There was a pagean feast of Lupercalia was where names of young girls were written on pieces of paper and placed into jars. Then, each boy would draw a girl's name from the jar and become partners, either for the duration of the festival, or the duration of a year (depending on your interpretation of history). This partnership was not necessarily platonic, so you can easily see how the Catholic church had problems with this Roman festival.

During the time of the Roman Empire, Emperor Claudius II of Rome (aka Claudius the Cruel) was having problems recruiting men as soldiers. He believed that the men were more attached to their homes and women and thus became weaker soldiers for that attachment. Claudius believed that if he outlawed all marriages and engagements, he would have more men willing to become soldiers, and be stronger for the lack of marriage. A Roman Priest, St. Valentine, secretly married couples even though it had been outlawed. He was ultimately caught and beheaded for his criminal acts.

Before this particular St. Valentine died, it is reported that he performed a miracle for one of his jailers who had a blind daughter. Depending again on your interpretation of history, St. Valentine became attached to the blind daughter of his jailer and prior to being put to death, wrote her a letter that was signed "From your Valentine".

Since the Catholoc church did not approve of the pagean holidays, they opted to change the name of the festival of Lupercalia to Valentine's Day (how historians made that connection is still sketchy to me...) and walla...you now have Valentine's Day.

Truly, I tend to believe another theory. Many historians agree that the first recorded association of Valentine's Day with romantic love was by Geoffrey Chaucer (1382). Chaucer had written a poem to honor the first anniversary of the engagement of King Richard II of England to Anne of Bohemia. This whole theory makes more sense and the concept of romantic love was also picked up by William Shakespeare. The holiday of St. Valentine's Day took root and has evolved over the centuries.

So, no matter what you want to believe about the origins of Valentine's Day, have a wonderful day. Happy Valentine's Day.

Until tomorrow...