Who’s ready to see all that red and pink in the seasonal aisle go?
It’s February 14th and somehow there seems to be an air of stale flatness in the air. Maybe it’s all the Valentines we’ve been writing. Maybe it’s all the money we’ve been spending. No matter the cause, Valentine’s Day has become an annual celebration that is loathed by both couples and singles alike.
We’re not saying we’re Anti-Valentine’s Day, because celebrating lovers, family, and life is after all, a beautiful thing. What we are concerned about this Valentine’s Eve, is ushering in a new approach to that fated day of February 14th.
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Among being the death date of Saint Valentine, check out this list of 14 other things that should be given a moment of recognition on February 14th, and they don’t cost a gosh damn thing.
1. Emperor Claudius II notices that single men make better soldiers than married men, so he makes marriage illegal. Saint Valentine continues marrying people in secret, is found out, and beheaded. (270)
2. The US flag is formally recognized for the first time by a foreign power, a French naval vessel (1778).
3. Frederick Douglass was born (1818).
4. Oregon was admitted as the 33rd US state (1859).
5. Oscar Wilde’s “Importance of Being Earnest” opened in London (1865).
6. Alexander Graham Bell applied for a patent for the telephone (1876).
7. Voting machines are approved for use in federal elections (1899).
8. Arizona was admitted as the 48th US state (1912).
9. Saint Valentine’s Day Massacre occurred, where six of Al Capone’s enemies were murdered in Chicago (1929).
10. The 1,000,000th vehicle crossed the NY Midtown Tunnel (1941).
11. The first “micro on a chip” was patented by Texas Instruments (1978).
12. The spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker is the first spacecraft to orbit an asteroid (2000).
13. Dolly, a female sheep and the first cloned mammal, dies (2003).
14. As part of the Arab Spring, the Bahraini uprising began (2011).
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Call it what you will, but let this be your first alternative Valentine’s Day!
