Well, here we are at the most romantic time of the year—Valentine’s Day. In ancient, pr-Christian Rome, there was a festival that lasted from February 13-15 called Lupercalia. They would sacrifice goats and a dog. This was thought to purify the city, and bring health and fertility. There was a big celebration of breastfeeding, much like you see when soccer moms gather in coffee shops today to talk about breastfeeding so loud that everyone knows that they had extracted a couple pints of milk for the baby that they dropped off at daycare.
Anyway, the ancient festival would also offer cakes as a sacrifice. These cakes were made by a whole bunch of virgin women, called Vestal Virgins. They remained virgins for 30 years, after being inducted at about the age of 10, and then they retired at the age of 40ish with a full pension. It was considered a great honor to marry one of them, and noblemen would compete for the right.. So, after the animals were killed at the altar, two priests would then anoint their foreheads with blood left on the knife from the sacrifice. That would then be washed away with a wool rag soaked in milk. These two priests would then laugh at each other, which must have been creepy. Next, strips of the hide (they were called Februa, from which we get the word February) and these strips of goat hide would be carried by young men who ran naked in a circle around a hill. They slapped people with those bloody strips, and this was thought to help women get pregnant or make pregnancy go well. That was Lupercalia. Later, we get Valentine’s Day, at the same time of year, which makes all of that stuff look somewhat normal. Well, maybe not normal, but let’s face it, Valentine’s Day drives people crazy.
Me, I try not to get too excited. All you really need to do is send flowers. If your wife works with other women, it is best to send the flowers there. If she gets a bunch of them delivered in front of all the other gals, then you will have made a a good show. It is also important to take her out to supper as well. Here is how that is done best: make a reservation a few weeks in advance. But make it for 8 o’clock. When it comes time to take your wife for supper you simply say, “Whew, I really had to pull some strings to get reservations, but we have them. Tonight at eight.” My wife, Renee, then goes to work thrilled that I was able to get a reservation on such a busy day. But, did you see what I did there? Waiting until 8 o’clock means that I can hunt until dark!
Alright, now that is a veteran move. If you are a Newlywed, that may not work. You will have to test the waters. But once you have some years of service, you can get by with hunting a few hours in the afternoon and meeting her later. I once officiated a wedding, and the gal that played the guitar for this outdoor wedding was really talented. She writes her own songs, and sings. She almost made it on TV for American Idol. She just had to win one more contest or whatever it is called. I don’t watch the show, but it was all over our local news.
Anyway,, after I pronounced them as married, they kissed, and I sent the bride and groom marching down the outdoor aisle, which was a mowed path. I looked to the musician, and indicated that she should play some sort of recessional music. She launched into a very good cover, which she totally owned, and made it her own. She strummed a few chords, and I thought, “No” to myself, since I knew the song, but she did perform a fantastic rendition of Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues.” I shrugged my shoulders, and enjoyed the song.
“Sorry,” she said, “I do not know many love songs.”
“Meh,” I answered. Prison. Marriage, They are both institutions and leave you institutionalized.”
IF YOU ARE NOT INSTITUTIONALIZED, then you will not get away with hunting on Valentine’s Day. Your wife needs to have other married friends for enough years that she realizes that spending time in the woods chasing rabbits is not the worst behavior that a man can display, Let her hear about all the stuff her friends deal with. Staying out late at night, chasing other women, that kind of stuff. Once you have been married a dozen years or more, she will have no trouble with you going to the woods.
“Say honey bunny,” I said last year on Valentine’s Day, “Since we aren’t able to eat the fancy steak dinner until 8 o’clock, would it be alright if I hunted the last couple hours of daylight? I will come home right after, wash up, and we can go eat.”
“Yes, go ahead,” Renee said, “Oh, and I picked up those .410 shells that were on sale at the mall. I was looking for gloves, and saw the good price. I put them on your desk.”
“Well,” I said, “Happy Valentine’s Day to me.” That, my friends, is fully institutionalized. She went to work and got flowers. Am I saying that I pulled one over on Renee? Nah, she probably knows. February 14 isn’t the only day that I hunt the last hour of daylight. I do it quite a bit. And there are some things that you can do to help out even more. When we first married, my refrigerator wasn’t domestic. It was mostly mustards and hot sauce. Maybe 5 of each. And the fishing bait was on the top shelf (hey, the bottom was too cold). That was in September, when we married. In the fall, she come home to a common sight—dead rabbits soaking in a little saltwater. Yep, right there on the top shelf. All these years later it is no trouble now, but when we first married she wasn’t fond of the sight. Especially if it was a great day afield, and I had her favorite Tupperware container filled with rabbit meat, right where she could see it. What was my solution? I bought a dorm fridge advertised as being for sale, in May, when the college kids went home. I got my own fridge for bait and bunnies—and it was viewed as the kindest thing I could have done.
Here is the last thing that makes the day go well. You have to get one of those blank cards. There’s a bunch in my house, because Renee went through a phase where she was making homemade cards for people. For all occasions. Congratulation cards for any achievement, get well cards, birthday cards (of course) graduation cards, and many more. In case your wife doesn’t make cards, it is basically an art project that takes 4 hours, and Lord knows how much paper, glue, glitter, stamps, and stickers. There is no cost savings, as I believe each card has a minimum of $10 worth of materials. All the glue and glitter means that it will be cheaper to put the thing in a priority mail envelope than to pay for regular stamps.They are way too heavy for one stamp.
Don’t worry about the glitter or anything. Just get a blank card, and then wrote your own Valentine. It doesn’t have to be that good. It doesn’t have to rhyme. It is. However, one of those things where quantity matter as much as quality. I just wrote all the things that Renee does to make me happy. Sometimes you have to start thinking about these things the day before to get a long enough list. Tiny things work. “You make the best pie” is okay. She is always noticing the tiny things. Good and bad,
See, and here is the thing, when 5 o’clock rolls around and it is time to be getting hungry, she will be home waiting while you are finishing up the hunt. When you leave for the hunt, you have to leave this card where she will find it. She will be delighted. This then lets you be a little late getting home, if you hunted a good spot a bit further from home. Leave the card with one fancy chocolate bar. One candy bar is good—you buy the biggest box of candy you can find, and she will think you are calling her heavy. One. Expensive. Chocolate. That is it. She will eat it while reading the card.
I was sharing all this with a young man recently, who got married this past summer.
“Man,” he said, “How did you learn all that?”
In my best imitation of Morgan Freerman, from Shawshank Redemption, I said “Young man, I have been thoroughly institutionalized. And it ain’t all bad.”
Anyway, the ancient festival would also offer cakes as a sacrifice. These cakes were made by a whole bunch of virgin women, called Vestal Virgins. They remained virgins for 30 years, after being inducted at about the age of 10, and then they retired at the age of 40ish with a full pension. It was considered a great honor to marry one of them, and noblemen would compete for the right.. So, after the animals were killed at the altar, two priests would then anoint their foreheads with blood left on the knife from the sacrifice. That would then be washed away with a wool rag soaked in milk. These two priests would then laugh at each other, which must have been creepy. Next, strips of the hide (they were called Februa, from which we get the word February) and these strips of goat hide would be carried by young men who ran naked in a circle around a hill. They slapped people with those bloody strips, and this was thought to help women get pregnant or make pregnancy go well. That was Lupercalia. Later, we get Valentine’s Day, at the same time of year, which makes all of that stuff look somewhat normal. Well, maybe not normal, but let’s face it, Valentine’s Day drives people crazy.
Me, I try not to get too excited. All you really need to do is send flowers. If your wife works with other women, it is best to send the flowers there. If she gets a bunch of them delivered in front of all the other gals, then you will have made a a good show. It is also important to take her out to supper as well. Here is how that is done best: make a reservation a few weeks in advance. But make it for 8 o’clock. When it comes time to take your wife for supper you simply say, “Whew, I really had to pull some strings to get reservations, but we have them. Tonight at eight.” My wife, Renee, then goes to work thrilled that I was able to get a reservation on such a busy day. But, did you see what I did there? Waiting until 8 o’clock means that I can hunt until dark!
Alright, now that is a veteran move. If you are a Newlywed, that may not work. You will have to test the waters. But once you have some years of service, you can get by with hunting a few hours in the afternoon and meeting her later. I once officiated a wedding, and the gal that played the guitar for this outdoor wedding was really talented. She writes her own songs, and sings. She almost made it on TV for American Idol. She just had to win one more contest or whatever it is called. I don’t watch the show, but it was all over our local news.
Anyway,, after I pronounced them as married, they kissed, and I sent the bride and groom marching down the outdoor aisle, which was a mowed path. I looked to the musician, and indicated that she should play some sort of recessional music. She launched into a very good cover, which she totally owned, and made it her own. She strummed a few chords, and I thought, “No” to myself, since I knew the song, but she did perform a fantastic rendition of Johnny Cash’s “Folsom Prison Blues.” I shrugged my shoulders, and enjoyed the song.
“Sorry,” she said, “I do not know many love songs.”
“Meh,” I answered. Prison. Marriage, They are both institutions and leave you institutionalized.”
IF YOU ARE NOT INSTITUTIONALIZED, then you will not get away with hunting on Valentine’s Day. Your wife needs to have other married friends for enough years that she realizes that spending time in the woods chasing rabbits is not the worst behavior that a man can display, Let her hear about all the stuff her friends deal with. Staying out late at night, chasing other women, that kind of stuff. Once you have been married a dozen years or more, she will have no trouble with you going to the woods.
“Say honey bunny,” I said last year on Valentine’s Day, “Since we aren’t able to eat the fancy steak dinner until 8 o’clock, would it be alright if I hunted the last couple hours of daylight? I will come home right after, wash up, and we can go eat.”
“Yes, go ahead,” Renee said, “Oh, and I picked up those .410 shells that were on sale at the mall. I was looking for gloves, and saw the good price. I put them on your desk.”
“Well,” I said, “Happy Valentine’s Day to me.” That, my friends, is fully institutionalized. She went to work and got flowers. Am I saying that I pulled one over on Renee? Nah, she probably knows. February 14 isn’t the only day that I hunt the last hour of daylight. I do it quite a bit. And there are some things that you can do to help out even more. When we first married, my refrigerator wasn’t domestic. It was mostly mustards and hot sauce. Maybe 5 of each. And the fishing bait was on the top shelf (hey, the bottom was too cold). That was in September, when we married. In the fall, she come home to a common sight—dead rabbits soaking in a little saltwater. Yep, right there on the top shelf. All these years later it is no trouble now, but when we first married she wasn’t fond of the sight. Especially if it was a great day afield, and I had her favorite Tupperware container filled with rabbit meat, right where she could see it. What was my solution? I bought a dorm fridge advertised as being for sale, in May, when the college kids went home. I got my own fridge for bait and bunnies—and it was viewed as the kindest thing I could have done.
Here is the last thing that makes the day go well. You have to get one of those blank cards. There’s a bunch in my house, because Renee went through a phase where she was making homemade cards for people. For all occasions. Congratulation cards for any achievement, get well cards, birthday cards (of course) graduation cards, and many more. In case your wife doesn’t make cards, it is basically an art project that takes 4 hours, and Lord knows how much paper, glue, glitter, stamps, and stickers. There is no cost savings, as I believe each card has a minimum of $10 worth of materials. All the glue and glitter means that it will be cheaper to put the thing in a priority mail envelope than to pay for regular stamps.They are way too heavy for one stamp.
Don’t worry about the glitter or anything. Just get a blank card, and then wrote your own Valentine. It doesn’t have to be that good. It doesn’t have to rhyme. It is. However, one of those things where quantity matter as much as quality. I just wrote all the things that Renee does to make me happy. Sometimes you have to start thinking about these things the day before to get a long enough list. Tiny things work. “You make the best pie” is okay. She is always noticing the tiny things. Good and bad,
See, and here is the thing, when 5 o’clock rolls around and it is time to be getting hungry, she will be home waiting while you are finishing up the hunt. When you leave for the hunt, you have to leave this card where she will find it. She will be delighted. This then lets you be a little late getting home, if you hunted a good spot a bit further from home. Leave the card with one fancy chocolate bar. One candy bar is good—you buy the biggest box of candy you can find, and she will think you are calling her heavy. One. Expensive. Chocolate. That is it. She will eat it while reading the card.
I was sharing all this with a young man recently, who got married this past summer.
“Man,” he said, “How did you learn all that?”
In my best imitation of Morgan Freerman, from Shawshank Redemption, I said “Young man, I have been thoroughly institutionalized. And it ain’t all bad.”
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