VDay 2k13: Enough is enough

Valentine’s Day exists pretty much exclusively for those in the smug 6-month honeymoon period between your first kiss and the harrowing realisation that you’re turning into somebody’s long-term something. It’s […]


Valentine’s Day exists pretty much exclusively for those in the smug 6-month honeymoon period between your first kiss and the harrowing realisation that you’re turning into somebody’s long-term something. It’s the point when using the first-person plural feels like getting ID’d the first time after you turn eighteen, like you’ve been lying about it forever and now it’s turned into an unlikely truth and you can’t quite believe it. I like to call it the Taylor Swift stage of a relationship. For the rest of us who don’t feel like Love Story was written for them, it can be a traumatic occasion.

Last year I spent most of my Valentine’s night sitting in the McIntosh TV room, making terrifically funny jokes about STDs and pondering how many cats I’d have to adopt to distract myself from the taunting possibility that I might never have sex again. I had a lot of time to kill while I waited for the all clear to head to bed from my loved up roommate. I was wearing a bright pink silk backless dress, which had failed to get me any kind of action. The evening’s photographs, taken earlier at Rascals and the Union (yup, that kind of a night) made me look like an angry bridesmaid – which is, I suppose, rather how I felt. I’ve always been one for dressing thematically. I wear stars and stripes on the fourth of July and apply a Mac makeup counter’s worth of liquid eyeliner on the anniversary of Amy Winehouse’s death (RIP, sister). But really tarting yourself up for Valentine’s Day seems like tempting fate. There’s even the possibility that you might be taking the whole thing, gasp, a little too seriously.

When I put the question of Valentine’s attire to the general public (three hungover Glaswegians in varying states of singleness), their answers differed quite a bit from the classy Cosmo suggestions of red lingerie and a pink bodycon. Instead, they suggested “easy access,” “not a onesie,” and “a vial of my own tears tied around my neck”, which sounds like a cross between a Taking Back Sunday lyric and something that would pop up on regretsy.com.

I’ve decided I’ll be taking a more practical approach to dressing myself this Thursday. I’m dyeing my hair pale pink (mostly because Scottish wind and rain are already turning it into candy floss). As far as any novelty romantic fashion decisions go, that’s it. I’ll be wearing comfortable shoes, a woolly jumper, and possibly thermal underwear, because if my, uh, significant other likes me enough to brave a one-on-one VD with me (told you my STD jokes were hilarious), then he probably also likes me enough not to wish a runny nose and chesty cough on my post-Valentine’s weekend. Keeping up with that pragmatism, I’d recommend loose fitting waistbands for anyone who falls for the ludicrously overpriced three course “deals” popping up at every curry house and pseudo-Italian chain. You’re going to have to eat every morsel to even begin to justify spending that kind of cash on one Thursday night meal. Look nice, by all means. All I ask is please, for everyone’s sake, avoid the cut-out-heart blouses and scarlet peep-toed stilettos that Asos fashion finder suggests for a mid-February date night. Just remember that we live in a cobbled town on the East coast of Fife. If you’re wearing something so heavily red-and-pink that it wouldn’t make sense on any other day of the year, you’re probably trying too hard.

It’s the Camembert of cultural/Christian/commercial festivals, and it’s not even a bank holiday. Valentine’s day is, to put it bluntly, crap. Let’s not forget that Saint Valentine is also the patron saint of epilepsy, beekeepers (seriously) and, tellingly, plague. And even if you’re one half of a self-congratulatory couple on VD 2k13, you may well not be in twelve months time. Students are fickle, and, at the risk of being labeled a cynic, I reckon one summer away from ending it with your pasty St Andrean sidekick, regardless of how happy the two of you were while sharing a seat during revision week in the library.

Happy Valentine’s Day, lovebirds.