That's Amore
No, trust me, this will make sense in just a sec. Just read the blog and then come back, and you'll be all "Oooohhh, I get it now..."
There are two kinds of people in the world: People who think Valentine’s Day is adorable, and people who are single. Based on the content of my blog over the past few months, I’m sure you can tell that I’m not only single, but also jaded and cynical to the point that my heart is as cold and bitter as an ear wax popsicle. Valentine’s Day has been over commercialized – “No duh, Truman” says your 1994 alter ego, “But that’s no reason to be a total buzzkill about it.” Well, with all due respect, I think this is a holiday especially in need of trashing, and also I suggest that you enjoy Clinton while you can.
Valentine’s Day has given birth to the notion that if you want to tell someone you love them, you should do it on one day of the year – the day that they’re expecting it. This takes the spur of the moment, giddy excitement out of love in the same way that calling the terrorists beforehand takes the shock-and-awe fear factor out of late night commando raids. Valentine’s Day is essentially a heavy handed shove toward romance for unromantic guys who, by virtue of Aryan features or a trendy, single syllable name, have wound up with girlfriends. Why be spontaneous and romantic all year round when you can put on a tie and smooth out your spiked hair to take your girl to Olive Garden on February 14th when everyone else is doing it?
Being the prolific bachelor that I am, I tend to get a bit cranky around this time of year. I pride myself on having dated some redonkulously great women; however, none of my relationships have ever fallen on Valentine’s Day, so I’ve never had the chance to view it as anything more than a voyeuristic outsider looking in on everyone else’s romantic bliss. Adding to that is the fact that I’d expected things to be different this year, my freshman year of college. In high school, where I was trapped in an asbestos laced prison filled with cliques tighter than anything Tony Hawk does on his skateboard, asking women out for a guy like me was about as easy as building a treehouse using three nails and my wang as a hammer. But this didn’t bother me too much, because I figured that in college, where social castes weren’t as important and beautiful women practically grew on trees, that I would be swamped with potential mates come February 14th.
I was partially right: there are literally hundreds of drop dead gorgeous women at the University of Oregon. If any of you are reading this, do please give yourselves a hand. However, I went wrong because I came to school assuming that it would be like a petting zoo, whereas it’s actually a lot more like the Lourve: You’re face to face with the utmost in beauty, but none of it talks to you and touching is a definite no-no. And of course, it doesn’t help that I don’t drink, because I get the idea that most relationships are started when one or both involved parties are blitzed out of their skulls. Because, really, women don’t need men, as many girls have tearfully told me after ChadBiffLyle breaks up with them, because we traditionally offer little more than simple physical protection and reproductive opportunities, both of which women can now take care of themselves with tasers and sperm banks. What sober woman would take on what is essentially an emotionally handicapped tumor that will still look at porn while she dates him?
The fun-ness of sex is probably one reason, but there’s another, more sentimental explanation that I prefer to believe. Women and men might just put up with each other because love doesn’t suck quite as much as I say it does (it comes close, though). Valentine’s Day, despite all my griping, is sort of like a homecoming parade for the people who put up with the constant, and believe me I mean really flippin’ constant crap that a relationship throws at them and continue to weather the storm. A lot of people have compared love to a rose, because it has thorns that you have to put up with to enjoy its beauty. These people, despite being well intentioned, have it all wrong, and I’ll take this opportunity to present my own metaphor:
Love is like an MG42 machine gun operated by a crack squad of Nazi Stormtroopers on the outskirts of Stalingrad in early 1943. The Battle of Stalingrad, which is widely considered the bloodiest battle in the history of armed conflict, frequently saw hordes of untrained Russian conscripts charging German machine gun nests in an attempt to overwhelm them when they ran out of bullets. Thousands and thousands of people died this way, but every so often a few conscripts managed to survive long enough to kill the Germans, capture the machine gun, and continue in the fight against fascism. So, you see, that’s what love is. You take on incredible, nay, suicidal risk in the pursuit of something good – and if you don’t, your commanding officer shoots you for cowardice.
Have a happy Valentine’s Day tomorrow, everybody. Chances are, you’ve earned it.
His knowledge of obscure World War 2 history is probably one of the reasons Truman Capps is single.
Valentine’s Day has given birth to the notion that if you want to tell someone you love them, you should do it on one day of the year – the day that they’re expecting it. This takes the spur of the moment, giddy excitement out of love in the same way that calling the terrorists beforehand takes the shock-and-awe fear factor out of late night commando raids. Valentine’s Day is essentially a heavy handed shove toward romance for unromantic guys who, by virtue of Aryan features or a trendy, single syllable name, have wound up with girlfriends. Why be spontaneous and romantic all year round when you can put on a tie and smooth out your spiked hair to take your girl to Olive Garden on February 14th when everyone else is doing it?
Being the prolific bachelor that I am, I tend to get a bit cranky around this time of year. I pride myself on having dated some redonkulously great women; however, none of my relationships have ever fallen on Valentine’s Day, so I’ve never had the chance to view it as anything more than a voyeuristic outsider looking in on everyone else’s romantic bliss. Adding to that is the fact that I’d expected things to be different this year, my freshman year of college. In high school, where I was trapped in an asbestos laced prison filled with cliques tighter than anything Tony Hawk does on his skateboard, asking women out for a guy like me was about as easy as building a treehouse using three nails and my wang as a hammer. But this didn’t bother me too much, because I figured that in college, where social castes weren’t as important and beautiful women practically grew on trees, that I would be swamped with potential mates come February 14th.
I was partially right: there are literally hundreds of drop dead gorgeous women at the University of Oregon. If any of you are reading this, do please give yourselves a hand. However, I went wrong because I came to school assuming that it would be like a petting zoo, whereas it’s actually a lot more like the Lourve: You’re face to face with the utmost in beauty, but none of it talks to you and touching is a definite no-no. And of course, it doesn’t help that I don’t drink, because I get the idea that most relationships are started when one or both involved parties are blitzed out of their skulls. Because, really, women don’t need men, as many girls have tearfully told me after ChadBiffLyle breaks up with them, because we traditionally offer little more than simple physical protection and reproductive opportunities, both of which women can now take care of themselves with tasers and sperm banks. What sober woman would take on what is essentially an emotionally handicapped tumor that will still look at porn while she dates him?
The fun-ness of sex is probably one reason, but there’s another, more sentimental explanation that I prefer to believe. Women and men might just put up with each other because love doesn’t suck quite as much as I say it does (it comes close, though). Valentine’s Day, despite all my griping, is sort of like a homecoming parade for the people who put up with the constant, and believe me I mean really flippin’ constant crap that a relationship throws at them and continue to weather the storm. A lot of people have compared love to a rose, because it has thorns that you have to put up with to enjoy its beauty. These people, despite being well intentioned, have it all wrong, and I’ll take this opportunity to present my own metaphor:
Love is like an MG42 machine gun operated by a crack squad of Nazi Stormtroopers on the outskirts of Stalingrad in early 1943. The Battle of Stalingrad, which is widely considered the bloodiest battle in the history of armed conflict, frequently saw hordes of untrained Russian conscripts charging German machine gun nests in an attempt to overwhelm them when they ran out of bullets. Thousands and thousands of people died this way, but every so often a few conscripts managed to survive long enough to kill the Germans, capture the machine gun, and continue in the fight against fascism. So, you see, that’s what love is. You take on incredible, nay, suicidal risk in the pursuit of something good – and if you don’t, your commanding officer shoots you for cowardice.
Have a happy Valentine’s Day tomorrow, everybody. Chances are, you’ve earned it.
His knowledge of obscure World War 2 history is probably one of the reasons Truman Capps is single.