Each year, the malls overflow with red, pink, and white—Valentine’s Day merchandise.  Thousands of stores advertise hearts and flowers and teddy bears and candy.  Logos and balloons shine brightly on walls—I love you, be mine, sweetheart.  Each year over a billion Valentine’s Day cards are bought, making it the second most celebrated holiday.  Approximately 85% of these cards are bought by women.  The desire for candy and flowers also increases drastically in the month of February.  In 2005, Americans consumed approximately 25 pounds of chocolate on average.  That very same year, flower sales generated $397 million and, in 2006, jewelry sales generated $2.6 billion.  Is this really what Valentine’s Day should be about?  Or is this what Valentine’s Day has become?
Believe it or not, Valentine’s Day dates back to the Roman Empire—February was an exciting and joyous time of the year due to the Lupercalia Festival commemorating spring.  The festival paid respects to Faunus, the god of agriculture, as well as Romulus and Remus, the very founders of Rome.  Men, women, and children would clean the house for the new spring season, traditionally sprinkling salt and wheat in their homes.  The festival began with the Roman priests gathering in the very cave where Romulus and Remus where thought to be raised by a wolf or lupa.  The priests would then sacrifice a goat and a dog—the strips of hide from the goat were thought to bring fertility to the women of Rome while the blood of the dog was meant to purify Rome.  That very same evening, it is believed that the women of Rome would place their names in an urn, and the single men would withdraw a name from the urn—this signified that the couple was destined to remain together for the year and these pairings often resulted in marriages.  However, Christianity deemed these pairings as pagan and it is thought that the Church created Valentine’s Day in order to shadow the Lupercalia Festival.
Valentine’s Day was always meant to be romantic—the holiday was named after St. Valentine, who was a hero for all young couples.  When Emperor Claudius II banned marriage because he feared that his soldiers would desert the army in order to remain with their wives, St. Valentine would secretly marry the couples.  However, St. Valentine was jailed for his disobedience and condemned to death—according to legend, he fell in love with the jailer’s daughter who would visit him, signing his last letter to her: From your Valentine.