In this day and age men hunt for women and women hunt for shoes — and sometimes handbags. Once the hunt is over the picture changes: men become lazy and women want to go shopping again. This paradigm of men wanting less and women wanting more is brightly illuminated on St. Valentine’s Day.

St. Who?

Now that I’m not single — the hunt is over for me (hopefully) — I have to approach this day from the vantage point of a non-single bloke. No more getting pissed and stoned at home watching ‘When Giant Squids Attack’ for me… Nope, I have toembrace this occasion, harness its potential, and make the little lady feel special.

Off the top of my head I have no idea how St. Valentines day came about. I’m sure I was told a million times but just like “what human resource people do”, I forget every time. I know it’s a day made famous by Hallmark and saccharine greeting cards and that it forces men to do something romantic at least once a year. I also know that I must become an amalgam of Viggo Mortensen (“Lord of the Rings”), Harrison Ford (“Han Solo”/”Indiana Jones” interchangeable) and Hugh Grant (not the “Devine Brown incident” one) at least for one day.

Google to the rescue

I’ve just typed “what to do on Valentines Day” into Google and prayed to the god of search engines to save my bacon. The first result is “Valentine’s day Fun for kids”. Hmmm, not much help there since I have no kids and if I did I’d send them packing to Aunt Matilda with her cats and strange pagan ways.

The second result is “The History of Valentines Day”, which has the following opening paragraph:
“Every February, across the country, candy, flowers, and gifts are exchanged between loved ones, all in the name of St. Valentine. But who is this mysterious saint and why do we celebrate this holiday? Read more » (bugger it, I’ll forget anyway).

The third result coming from indiaserver.com looks more promising: “Romantic things to do on Valentines Day”. One suggestion offers “putting little chocolates all over the floor and leave a note saying ‘I kiss the ground you walk on’.”

This won’t work. She will probably trod on one and I’ll have to spend an hour chiselling chocolate bits from the carpet with a butter knife.

Another suggestion: “scattering rose petals on the floor to lead you to the person you love”. This one perplexed me for obvious reasons.

The last proposal is completely useless: “Take her for a moonlit walk on the beach”. Sadly I don’t live in Cape Town anymore and have sacrificed watching the golden sunsets (not sun rises) from Clifton beach for the smog and pollution of London. (My ex-girlfriend once took a group of tourists to Clifton to watch the sun rise over the sea, only to realise that the ambient morning light was coming from the opposite direction.) Anyway, rubbish suggestions so far so let me think for myself.

The inner romantic

I just sat back and tried to reach my inner romantic. Apparently he hasn’t been home for a while and left a note saying: “Will be out till late. Don’t wait up”. Curse this male disposition to lose your romantic drive once you’ve secured the deal.

I don’t know how many times girls have said to me, “he was so romantic in the beginning but now he just likes to sit around and watch the cricket/football/special on Kylies bum”. I’m stuck for ideas but have just thought that this male negligence to Valentines Day could be due to the trauma of youth.

Puberty

Valentine’s Day is a disturbing day for most young boys at school. It is a very sensitive, vulnerable time for the blossoming male psyche. Girls suddenly change from bizarre, strange, skipping creatures into sexy, bizarre, strange, skipping creatures.

You start thinking about them constantly and watch their mysterious rituals from a far. They’re fascinating and exciting and like Indiana Jones you must discover everything about them whilst facing the truly nasty booby traps put in your way.

Most nasty of these traps is of course puberty and as the comedian Eddie Izzard put it: “You suddenly think, YES, I wanna get off with these people, but then mother nature says NO - you will look the worst you’ve ever looked in your LIFE.”

It pays to persevere

But like Sisyphus, who was condemned forever to push a giant boulder up a hill, only to see it roll to the bottom, you keep building up your confidence to approach a young lass, only to see it knocked back down.

Of course, with all this pain and suffering, there is one day where your lack of charm but abundance of pimples is pasted all over the billboard. Cue Valentines Day.

I remember sitting at my desk with “Susie (whom I loved deeply) 4 Andre” scrawled into the wood; sweating, pale, feigning nonchalance, while the teacher stood up in the front of the class and handed out the Valentines Day cards to the all the lucky, loved sods.

Could it be that all these deep seated memories stop us from covering the house in rose petals and singing ‘Love me Tender’ at the top of your voice?

The dark side

So here I am, not a young whippersnapper anymore and getting into new relationship territory. It’s hard because with age your baggage accumulates and going anywhere new means more complications at the check in.

Coupled with these obstacles I’m now faced with the insurmountable pressure imposed by St. Valentine and the generations of marketing executives following his patronage.

They’re not going to beat me though, I will think of something. I’m off to bed now and I know that at some point in the middle of the night I’ll shoot upright in my bed, scribble down a fantastic idea, then wake up in the morning realising that “save her from Jabba the Hut” is not really the solution that’s going to make things happen. 

iafrica.com | http://lifestyle.iafrica.com/valentine/features/412428.htm