I never liked Valentine’s Day. Well, that’s not entirely
true. When I was in grade school, we used to have these fun parties where every
student would write a Valentine’s Day card for every other kid in the
class. Then we’d put all our cards inside a special Valentine’s Day mailbox,
and our teacher would play postman, showering us all with shallow yet sweet
messages of love, often with animal themes like: “Owl be your Valentine” or “Bee
mine” or “You’re Purr-fect!”
That’s what I liked about Valentine’s Day back then—it was so inclusive.
Everyone got a Valentine. Everyone felt loved.
But then I got to high school, and there was no longer a
teacher to make sure our expressions of love were democratized. During
homeroom, the popular girls would be deluged with multicolored roses from not
only their boyfriends but from all the guys who wished they were their
boyfriends. And me? I got nothing. Zip. Zilch. Nada. (Except the year my best
friend and I decided to send each other a rose so we’d feel less like losers.
It didn’t help.)
So basically I’ve hated Valentine’s Day ever since it
started feeling like a holiday meant only for the beautiful and the popular.
Valentine’s Day made me feel unworthy, unlovable, like I’d never be able to
partake in the festivities of flowers, chocolates and candle-lit dinners in the
way my more socially savvy peers did. Valentine’s Day seemed like a holiday for the few, and my exclusion from it left scars.
Now that I’m happily married, it shouldn’t matter anymore. In fact, my
husband and I have boycotted Valentine’s Day since we first started dating. And
despite not receiving a pink card or a heart-shaped box of chocolate every
February 14, I know that I am deeply loved. I know that I am married to the man I love. And I know that this is because I’m
free to love whomever I choose.
But just like in my high school days, I can’t help feeling
that this privilege of loving is still doled out unfairly. I usually don’t blog
about political topics, choosing to focus on oh-so-important matters like Doctor Who, swoony love interests from YA
fiction, or shameless acts of self-promotion. But California’s Proposition 8
was just ruled unconstitutional, a major victory for marriage equality. And yet
our country still has a long way to go. Yes, our country, which was founded on the
principle of equality and which prides itself on its diversity and tolerance,
has only six states that allow same sex marriage. We will never be a truly
enlightened nation until we grant all our citizens the right to love, and to marry, any person they choose,
regardless of sexual orientation.
And just because I love her, here is Ellen Degeneres
addressing critics who think she shouldn’t be a spokesperson for J.C. Penney
because she’s gay. In her inimitable warm and witty style, Ellen captures
what’s at the heart of this issue in the last thirty seconds: “Here are the
values I stand for. I stand for honesty, equality, kindness, compassion,
treating people the way you'd want to be treated and helping those in need. To
me, those are traditional values. That's what I stand for.”
I couldn’t have said it better myself.
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