Perhaps forbidding love for one day would be more powerful.
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Above is my official 10 Word Submission for the VALENTINE’S DAY BLOG SPEED-LIKING EXTRAVAGANZA over at the Cougar Garden.
It won’t come as any surprise to my normal regular readers that I don’t mind Valentine’s Day really. I’ve always enjoyed sparkles and hearts, an excuse to hand-write a card, and celebrating having or not having a Valentine.
But I don’t like the way it causes so much hurt and loneliness in so many people.
The joyful (if not entirely accurate) purpose is to celebrate love, and to remind us of all the different types of love that we all enjoy everyday. Love is not just about having found your one and only– it’s about the neighbors who hold hands on park benches, and air kisses from kittycats, and the way a 3-year-old holds your hand.
To achieve this goal better, I suggest flipping the holiday around and forbidding all things love.
Turning Valentine’s day into a no-love holiday would be an interesting twist because we all know how nothing makes people celebrate something more than forbidding it.
I think we’d start looking for signs of love everywhere, knowing in the back of our minds that it is not allowed– much the way we seem to see to have special vision for people who don’t wear green on St.Patty’s Day.
I think we’d find large quantities of rebels, choosing to celebrate their love that day even in the face of such a restriction. Or perhaps, because of said restriction.
We don’t want anyone to be pinched for being loving on that day though, because pinching is awful, so perhaps we could institute a different sort of punishment– like snapping.
For instance, if you’re holding hands with the love of your life, passerbyers would snap. When you say “Love you, Mom” at the end of the call, eavesdroppers would snap. When you draw a heart over your i’s, snap!
In the face of all that, people with valentines and those without would be equally aware of the love that surrounds us. The everyday type of love that keeps the world chugging along.
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So, what do you think? How would you react to a holiday that forbids something? Would you be the rebel or the snapper?
