The legend of Valentine’s Day

Valentine’s Day is on Sunday.  However, I am still not actually sure why we celebrate this day!

Here are 3 legends of how Valentine’s Day started, none of them have happy endings!

• Roman Catholic – Emperor Claudius II decided that single guys make better soldiers than married men, so he banned marriage. One Catholic priest named Valentine (there are two others) decided to ignore the decree and performed marriages in secret. He was executed! A possible start to the Valentine’s day tradition?

• According to one legend, an imprisoned Valentine actually sent the first “valentine” greeting himself after he fell in love with a young girl – possibly his jailer’s daughter – who visited him during his confinement. Before his death, it is alleged that he wrote her a letter signed “From your Valentine,” which is an expression that is still in use today. Maybe that is where the expression ball and chain comes from. Happy Valentine’s day?

• While some believe that Valentine’s Day is celebrated in the middle of February to commemorate the anniversary of Valentine’s death, or burial, sometime around 270 A.D. Others believe the Church chose the date, to interfere with the Pagan fertility festival dedicated to Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture and to the founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus.

  

Jewish Valentine’s Day

While there is no prohibition for Jews celebrating Valentine’s Day, we actually have our own day, Tu B’Av (the 15^th of the Hebrew month of Av) which falls this year on the 20th August! So, if you want to celebrate, roses and chocolates will be cheaper then!

I am not a great believer in commercialised holidays.  I am not really a romantic either and since my blog is mostly about people saving money, I really don’t go for the roses and chocolate effort.

Roses die and chocolates make you fat! A romantic dinner costs a fortune and lasts an hour.

If you insist on celebrating, why not do something that doesn’t cost you much?

Ladies, make dinner your husbands’ favourite meal and serve it slightly later just for you and hubby.  Possibly watch his favourite movie, or let him play his play station without nagging that it is bedtime! Make him really happy and ask him to teach you how to play the game!

Give him the darn beer and chips; you’ll clean the lounge tomorrow!

Or give him a voucher that says, you won’t nag him about XXXX for a whole week!

Be creative!

Gentlemen, take the kids out for the whole day and bring them home tired (not hyped up on sugar please)! For most moms’ that is worth 1000 red roses!

Go shopping with her and don’t look at your watch the entire time!

Take over her routine for the day! The dishes, the food, the kids, the house!

Dude, if she’s pregnant offer to paint her toe nails!

Do these and I guarantee you’re golden!

Just remember to ask first!  Some people like the soppy romance and for that there is ‘Harold’ at the relationship hot line, if you listen to the radio, in South Africa, and you all know who he works for! That florist place!