Valentine's Day

TO LOVE, DIVINE:We Wrap Your Feelings in Flowers and Fragrance

Does Valentine's Day find you tongue-tied and abashed? Boundless in your romantic expressiveness? Looking for traditional expression but with a twist? Since its inception 2400 years ago,Valentine's Day provides an opportunity to spoil and delight or maybe surprise someone by your show of affection. Yes, we all know that it's these deliberately structured days of celebration that churn our economy. And they may not seem necessary, after all you're a generous thoughtful person all year, right? But really, in the fast-paced life we experience today, I think any reason to celebrate is becoming essential. We need these reasons to celebrate, to be fanciful, to anticipate a today just a little more special than yesterday. Fuel for the optimist.

For ideas to create an enthusiastic response,see our suggestionsfor local delivery or look at our international page for unique and fun Valentine's ideas.

For help with your words, see the best of the romantics love poems. Or better yet, write your own and get rhyming help at the same site.

Valentine's Day Started by Luck of the Draw in 4th Century

As early as the fourth century B.C.,the Romans engaged in an annual young man's rite of passage to the god, Lupercus. The names of teenage women were placed in a box and drawn at random by adolescent men. Thus, a man was assigned a woman companion for their mutual entertainment (often sexual) for the duration of a year after which another lottery was staged.

Determined to put an end to this 800-year-old-practice, the early church fathers sought a "lovers" saint to replace the deity,Lupercus. They found a likely candidate in a saint, Valentine, a bishop who had been martyred 200 years earlier.Traditionally, mid-February was a time for Romans to meet and court prospective mates.

On February 14th, young men offered handwritten greetings of affection to women they admired and wished to court. The cards acquired St. Valentine's name.

As Christinaity spread,so did the Valentine's Day card ; the earliest one was sent in 1415 by Charles, Duke of Orleans to his wife while he was a prisoner in the Tower of London. It is now in the British Museum.The first American publisher of Valentines was printer and artist, Esther Howland.Her elaborate lace cards of the 1870s cost from five to $10 with some selling for as much as $35.Since then, the valentine card business has flourished, with North Americans exchanging more cards at Valentine's Day than any other occasion, except Christmas.(Excerpted from :Panati's Extraordinary Origins of Everyday Things," Charles Panati, Harper and Row, NY 1987 pp 50-52).

Cupid, son of Venus, Roman god of love and beauty became an early symbol of Valentine's Day.

When love is in the air, flowers are the extension of ourselves. Flowers introduce, soften the approach, seduce, supplement the conversation, and generally attest to what a nice thoughtful person you are. If you want to learn more about that special person you're interested in,to see how well-suited you are,or get to know yourself a little better try the affinity test ....