Now anyone who knows me at all well, knows two things about me. Firstly, that I have been a little unlucky when it comes to girls. Secondly, I have not dealt with that lack of success all that well. It's most likely a self-perpetuating thing, but it has often struck me as cruelly ironic that the very things that make me crave a relationship and so hyper aware of my singledom, are also the things that make me less appealing to girls. Seems a little mean really.
Because of this, February 14th isn't my favourite day of the year. I'm far too prone to over zealous analysis of my own life. I do it at the best of times, but Valentines Day, and the week leading up to it, are far from the best of times for me.
Yes it is horribly commercialised, with so many companies unashamedly attempting to make financial gains from people's awkward but well meant attempts at showing another person how much they mean.
Yes it is a damn shame that so many people use Valentines Day as an opportunity to excuse 364 days of being a less than fantastic partner. I whole heartedly agree with the commonly stated argument that you shouldn't need a specific day or a financially driven marketing campaign to encourage you to show affection to someone you care about.
Yes it puts an obscene amount of pressure on people to shell out money and make big declarations when it undoubtedly would be preferable that the progress of a relationship didn't come down to a date on a calendar.
Despite all that I don't dislike Valentines Day itself, i definitely don't begrudge any of the couples out there their happiness, not even for a moment. I hate the power the day has over me. I hate that i find the whole duration of Valentines so fucking hard. I would love it if I was just a little bit stronger and a little bit more reserved. I wish i'd had healthier distractions this weekend, but a combination of people going home, the majority of my friends being in long term relationships and the fact that there are a few too many reminders of my failed attempts to find romance among my friendship circle both at home and at uni has meant that I have been alone with my frustratingly melodramatic thoughts more than is necessarily advisable.
I'm doing my best to be optimistic (not something that always comes that naturally to me) about the future and i really hope that somewhere in the years ahead will be a Valentines Day i can enjoy in totally cheesy excess. For now i guess i just have to soldier on and i wholeheartedly wish everybody who has spent today with the person they like, or spent the day simply liking someone, every happiness in the world. Just because i'm not hand in hand with the love of my life tonight doesn't mean that i'm going to let myself become a bitter old man (no matter how tempting that sounds) and start being grumpy about people liking each other, regardless of how they choose to express that affection.
I started this blog so i could write honest, open snippets of my internal monologue and because of that initial intent, i don't apologise if this post has come across as cheesy, naive or melodramatic. This is a pretty honest representation of the stuff that's been going through my head over the last week, just more coherent and with marginally better grammar.
However i reckon i'll finish this blog with some slightly more light hearted elements.
First up, my top 5 fictional girls. These are girls in films/TV/books who for various reasons i'm pretty sure i'd fall for given half a chance if i met them in real life (The order is pretty flexible tbh)
1. Emma (From David Nicholls' novel "One Day")
2. Sam (From Garden State (2004), played by Natalie Portman)
3. Wichita (From Zombieland (2009) played by Emma Stone)
4. Victoria (From How I Met Your Mother, series 1, played by Ashley Williams)
5. Charlotte 'Chuck' Charles (From Pushing Daisies, played by Anna Friel)
Secondly, this is perhaps one of the most heart warming videos i've ever watched, makes me smile every time and i don't give a shit how cheesy that makes me - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-94JhLEiN0
Finally i stumbled across this montage video via the director Edgar Wright's twitter and at one of the points today where i was at the height of direction-less frustration and bitterness it cheered me up a bit - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4JdZcy59BYo
I hope today was a good day.
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