V-Day

Today is Valentine’s Day and since I may or may not be behind on my posting, I figured I might as well add to the V-Day prattle.

As a young woman, everything around me tells me I should either spend the day romantically with my (non-existent) boyfriend, or lamenting the fact that I do not have said boyfriend. Valentine’s Day – someone, somewhere is telling us – is important. Care. Care a lot.

Well, as I may have mentioned, I don’t have a boyfriend. And yes, sometimes this makes me bitter and frustrated and all those other fun emotions that come with being 20 and single and, possibly, identifying as a heterosexual woman at a women’s college. I suppose I went through a phase at some point where I refused to wear red on Valentine’s Day and really played up the angst, but at this point in my life, I don’t really care. I guess I’m mildly angsty about the single thing, but really, truly, hating Valentine’s Day with every fiber of my being just takes too much work. Yes, it’s completely commercialized and some of the glittery pink heart things are just a little too garish, but people like it, so who am I to interfere?

Keeping all of this in mind, I can’t help but think about the what-if’s. What if I did have a boyfriend this Valentine’s Day? Honestly, I’m not sure much would change. Don’t get me wrong – I love my chocolates and flowers as much as the next gal, and under normal circumstances I probably would expect something Valentine-y from the boyfriend, but I’m not sure I’d really go for all the sappy romantic Valentine’s Day stuff. I think it might feel contrived. Like some bizarre mixture of ‘OK, this is what we’re supposed to do’ and trying way, way too hard. Of course, this is all just speculation.

And then there’s the other meaning of V-Day – one that I think Bryn Mawr has really embraced, not only with the annual production of Eve Ensler’s Vagina Monologues, but also with the continued support of the V-Day cause. Vday.org took all the Valentine’s hubbub and ran with it to bring the issue of violence against women to the forefront of our minds. The organization reminds us that there are women across the globe who have other things to worry about besides the perfect dress for the dinner-date or the lack of said dinner-date. Valentine’s Day may be commercialized to hell and beyond, but when it comes down to it, it’s only a day. Come February 15, everything goes back to normal, the chalky candies and garish singing teddy bears get marked down to 50% off, and we go back to being people and not “single” or “in-a-relationship.” But V-Day lives on. It doesn’t get as much attention afterwards since it does play off the Valentine’s hype, but the feeling is still there. The flowers wilt, but we continue to fight to make the world a better place, not just for women, but for everyone.

So I got a lot more in-depth and serious and philosophical and whatnot than I thought I would there. I guess that’s a good thing…?