Written by our Founder and CEO, our Celebrations Pulse Sunday Letters aim to engage with our community. From sharing stories to welcoming your ideas, we want to help you to express, connect, and celebrate the important people in your life.
Rumor has it that long, long ago, the McCanns met secretly with Mr. Hall, the titan of the greeting card industry. Over espressos in South Queens, they twirled their mustaches and cooked up a plan to tie Valentine’s Day with cards, flowers, chocolate, and other symbols of affection.
You might be asking yourself, “Did 1-800-FLOWERS.COM and Hallmark really create an occasion to celebrate all of the loving relationships in your life?” Well, no…
But even if we did, we’d be happy to take credit for a day that leads nearly everyone on the planet to pause and take stock of their relationships. It’s an opportunity to think about the important people in our lives and reminds us that it’s in our power to impact the way the people around us feel.
The holiday is truly an occasion to celebrate love in all its forms. So, while we may not have created it, we wish we had!
Homemade Valentines to roses and chocolates
Many of us recall our children’s grade school years, when teachers encouraged us to make Valentines for all the loved ones in our life and for our classmates. We can still recall the markers, construction paper, glitter and glue, along with our creativity, that was used to craft those homemade cards. The greetings were eventually delivered to our parents, grandparents, siblings, friends, and our fellow classmates.
As we got older, the day turned into a way to celebrate the romantic loves in our lives. Homemade cards of our youth gave way to roses and chocolates.
Let’s go back to the lessons we learned in grade school and use this holiday as a chance to remember the people in our lives, to reach out to them, and to let them know what they mean to us. You have the power to affect how someone feels. Pick up the phone, send a text, or share a memory and let them know how much you are thinking of them during Valentine’s week.
All-in-tine’s Day
We encourage you to use this time to acknowledge different kinds of love in our lives. We’re calling it “All-in-tine’s” Day, to capture those micro moments of love and celebrate all its manifestations.
The truth is, Valentine’s Day was originally closer to the spirit of a Valentine’s Day for everyone. While the holiday appears to have begun with one or more Christian martyrs named St. Valentine who lived around 270 AD, it didn’t emerge as a romantic holiday until about the 14th century; some attribute it to Geoffrey Chaucer’s poem “The Parlement of Foules”, which connected the day with romance.
People first started exchanging cards around this time. However, the cards were not limited to couples. Some historians say that Valentine’s Day cards emerged from the German tradition of friendship cards (Freundschaftskarten) that friends exchanged on New Year’s Day, birthdays, and other anniversaries.
“If you read St. Valentine, he seemed to appreciate a broader sense of sharing love,” says Richard Beltramini, Ph.D., co-editor of Gift Giving: A Research Anthology.
All In for All-in-tine’s Day
There are endless people and ways to love. Don’t limit your celebrations to your romantic partner like your wife, husband, partner, or fiancée. Remember the preeminent love of your children. And the fraternal and maternal love for a mom, a dad, stepdad, or stepmom. There’s grand love for grandmothers and grandfathers, not to mention brotherly and sisterly love. And platonic love of friends, acquaintances, co-workers. Neighborly love. Protective love. Love of pets. The list goes on and on!
So, this year, join us in celebrating All-in-tine’s Day and recognize everyone you love romantically and otherwise. You can buy flowers, of course, send a card, make your own card, or just send a text, email or make a phone call to convey best wishes on Feb. 14 to all those who mean something to you.
All the Best,
Chris and Jim
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