Here’s an anonymous Valentine’s Day message I received in my inbox two years ago:

Valentine’s day is for the emotionally insecure:

Whenever i see someone smugly and ostentatiously accept a bunch of flowers in the office, I think of Saint Valentine being beaten and beheaded before being dumped unceremoniously on the Flaminian Way: Every Furtive glance around the office to confirm that they have the attention of their co-workers is a cudgel blow to St Valentine’s stupid head….

Most single people defensively maintain that to buy into St Valentine’s day is to pander to commercialism. Valentine’s day is (wrongly) believed as invented by greetings card companies in order to exploit one of our most basic desires: the need to be loved. Yet almost all of our celebrations are motivated in this way, through patterns dictated by the era of disorganised capitalism.

It’s true that i believe in God slightly less than I believe in the Easter bunny. I do, however believe in love, yet not as defined by desires similar to those which turn the wheels of assembly lines. It is in the external display of; the parading, the desperate shouting ‘I am loved!!’ in which Valentine’s day appears most vulgar.

?

Of course, the anonymous writer was Mark. Of course, today being’s Valentines’ day, I want to follow up with my tradition of going to MacDonald’s for dinner. We’ll see.