Where chaos stops and more chaos ensues. Where Filia plays the electric keyboard.
Where anything goes.
-//o_O\\7 *Home of the Awful, Mediocre and Pathetic* -//u_u\\7
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Where chaos stops and more chaos ensues. Where Filia plays the electric keyboard. Where anything goes. -//o_O\\7 *Home of the Awful, Mediocre and Pathetic* -//u_u\\7 |
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 I'm glad I'm so loved. Look, I even got a lovely, albeit somewhat corny St. Valentine's day message! Well, I guess that's only fair, since I did come up with one just for a special someone. It's so beautiful and blissful that our feelings are mutual ... *wistful sigh* n.n All right, fine, pleasantries over. The day's over. What's more important right now is ... the rant! Ah, yes, the usual rant about unnecessary holidays/events/festivals, et cetera. I don't recall ever coming up with one about St. Valentine's day, so I guess that for the sake of completeness it's only right that I grace these hallowed pages with one. Given my recent post about my rethinking the New Year (both of them, I being the perfectionist as always), it's fair that I shed a little new light on that special person ... I mean that special day we all know and love. If you ... anyone, out there? ... have been paying attention to my "holiday ranting" (heh, I could probably write a university thesis on all of this), you'd have read my recent comments about the sad abbreviationg of the commonplace term for the New Year to an even more plebeian three-letter acronym. Suffice to say, such a fate will never befall the semi-holiday that is St. Valentine's Day, because its acronym spells out something which most people would like to avoid catching on this special day while spending a more intimate moment with their loved ones. (On an aside, it's rather interesting how the above fact did not prevent the powers that be in Singapore from, officially, oh gasp, abbreviating "Total Defence Day" ... 15th February, the date of the fall of Singapore to the Japanese, for those less patriotic and consequently less aware of national affairs among us ... to "TD Day", another allusion to a very painful and debilitating disease publicised by the numbers of charity workers going around toting donation cans along with stickers with the acronym SATS on them. And no, I refer not to the Stupid American Travesty ... I mean, Scholastic Assessment Test.) Being the stickler for accuracy and precision that I am (how ironic...), I personally insist that one only refer to the festival falling on February 14 (ooh, nice alliteration) as St. Valentine's Day. Do not forget about the "saint" in that title, else ... else, um, deluded Final Fantasy fans would imagine that a day has been specially set aside to worship the gothic god of suaveness that is FF7's Vincent Valentine. As it is, however, some fangirls out there already consider him part, if not all saint, but for dealing with such severely deranged believers, it is my advice that, in the interests of your physical well-being, you not attempt to dispel their illusions from them. I'm quite sure that many observers of St. Valentine's Day out there are aware of one or more of the myths and fables surrounding the elusive St. Valentine and his rather unhappy demise. I personally remember my favourite version of the tale, where a rather nutty Roman emperor, seeking to focus his (ostensibly male) soldiers on the subject of conquest, decides to ban marriage. Note that he chose to ban marriage, probably to divest his soldiers from any kind of commitment to other worldly matters. He didn't ban fornication ... because soldiers need to be able to defeat the enemy, and you know what a lack of fornication tends to do to the more mentally deficient sex. In this tale, Valentine happens to be a (inevitably) handsome young man who has been unfortunately drafted into the army. Despite the restrictions on marriage, however, he woos a lovely little lass (of whom not much is said ...) and seals a marriage in secret. Somehow, in some way or another, his secret is betrayed, and he is thrown in jail to be tortured and eventually burnt in a fiery sacrifice to the gods. Um, yeah, that seems like a rather Romantic advertisement for marriage. I eagerly look forward to the appearance of flaming pyres and roasting bodies ("St. Valentine ... would you have his aspirations go up in smoke?! Get married today!") in the next variation of the Ministry of Community Development's advertisements. Okay, now, Charlotte, cut the rambling and just tell us ... what is wrong with this day? Well, on first sight, not much, anyway. The date isn't wrong ... don't forget, the saints' days aren't commemorating the birth or death or beatification of one saint or another. According to the Straits Times, there were at least three separate St. Valentines recorded in church annals (thus explaining the three different stories). They dates are probably simply assigned, most likely by blindfolded bishops throwing darts at the Julian calendar, no less. The principle isn't too incorrect either. A day (randomly assigned, yes, but it has got to be one day or another) set aside to commemorate the incredible and unique emotion that is love. Come on, surely you've learned something from Literature class? Love is a special emotion in that it is a completely human invention, and thus conveys the most significant aspects of humanity (well, on the other hand, Hatred is a completely human invention as well ...). I would argue that animals don't love each other. They care for each other, yes, but only because doing so is necessary to the successful procreation of their species. Humans are capable of loving each other purely for the pleasure and enjoyment of it (I would say "for fun", but it sounds too crude, and I'm actually trying to be serious here). To love another is philosophically the highest possible attainment in humanity. And as you might be able to infer from the contents of the post directly preceeding this one, my "humanity" is something which, in the minds of observers, remains perpetually in doubt. Why then, given the noble nature of human love, has St. Valentine's Day decended into the crude, orgy of debauchery that it is today, with the exchanging (in some cultures, an unrequited gift) of wads of insanely expensive presents between couples, indulgence in all manner of sinful luxury like cruises and spa treatments, not to mention the inflation of the prices of roses to, sometimes, up to nearly five dollars a stalk? The answer, my friend, is blowing in the ghastly excessively-perfumed wind. posted by Charlotte | 3:59 pm
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Disclaimer : The Slayers and Filia Ul Copt and all images thereof are the property of Hajime Kanzaka and Rui Araizumi. I don't own any of them, although if I had a choice I would want Filia ... ~//n_n\\7 |
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