{"id":19029,"date":"2020-02-19T09:00:13","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T17:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=19029"},"modified":"2020-02-14T14:45:42","modified_gmt":"2020-02-14T22:45:42","slug":"open-space-how-to-celebrate-valentines-day-next-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2020\/02\/19\/open-space-how-to-celebrate-valentines-day-next-year\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Space<\/em>: How to celebrate Valentine\u2019s Day next year"},"content":{"rendered":"

Valentine\u2019s Day has finally passed, and the leftover chocolate is going on clearance in stores nationwide. Pretty much every Shoppers Drug Mart, Walmart, and Dollarama is getting rid of their sugary treats, offering a lower price for the past-holiday items. Now, I love discount chocolate, don\u2019t get me wrong, but Valentine\u2019s Day has always kind of bugged me. I didn\u2019t mind it growing up, but as I\u2019ve gotten older I\u2019ve come to the realization that everyone slowly comes to: the holiday is a bit of a scam.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The origins of Valentine\u2019s Day are complicated, and not anything near what you traditionally think of when someone mentions the holiday, but it\u2019s become a day to recognize that special person in your life who makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside. I think this is probably my main problem with Valentine\u2019s Day\u2014how it\u2019s celebrated and how it should be celebrated are two different things.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
This story originally appeared in our February 19, 2020 issue.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For a holiday that\u2019s supposed to represent our love (and not just romantic love) toward all kinds of people close to us, it\u2019s centred on spousal relationships exclusively. This leaves people without these connections feeling left out of what should be a universal holiday. You\u2019ve probably heard people calling February 14 \u201cForever Alone Day\u201d or \u201cSad Singles Day.\u201d This is a perfect example of the divide that can be created by this holiday. Spending the day without a romantic partner can make you feel lonely, especially when you\u2019re bombarded by social media posts and advertisements featuring happy couples having a good time.<\/p>\n

What I\u2019d like to know is why the day that celebrates love doesn\u2019t seem to include every kind of love. The love you feel for your friends differs from the kind of love you feel toward your family, and the love you feel for your family differs from the love you feel toward yourself. Ancient Greek philosophy actually breaks the English word \u201clove\u201d into many different categories that take these differences into account. There\u2019s, among others, philia<\/i>, which refers to the affection seen between friends; \u00e9ros<\/i>, <\/i>which refers to a sexual or intimate love; storge<\/i>, which includes the love between parents and children; and philautia<\/i>, meaning love directed toward yourself.<\/p>\n

The way I see it, Valentine\u2019s Day should be celebrated with everyone you love, no matter what kind of love that may be. Have a good friend who you love chatting with? Why not make them a card telling them how important they are to you? Or what about your mom\/dad\/guardian? Why not grab them a treat? Something that I like to do every year is take my friends on a \u201cfriendship date.\u201d It\u2019s nothing too fancy\u2014maybe dinner at a local restaurant, or a fun night bowling\u2014but I make sure that the people close to me know how much I value them.<\/p>\n

At the end of the day, Valentine\u2019s Day is a day to celebrate love, and that love doesn\u2019t have to mean romance. If you\u2019ve never done anything for friends or family, give it a shot. Maybe next year you can make your own cards, go on a friendship date, or just spend some time with the people you care about. Perhaps in the future celebrating our connections will be more of a central theme for this holiday, but for now, you can make sure to get the message out there: Valentine\u2019s Day isn\u2019t just for couples. It\u2019s a day for friends, family, and everyone else we care about.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Valentine\u2019s Day has finally passed, and the leftover chocolate is going on clearance in stores nationwide. Pretty much every Shoppers Drug Mart, Walmart, and Dollarama is getting rid of their sugary treats, offering a lower price for the past-holiday items. Now, I love discount chocolate, don\u2019t get me wrong, but Valentine\u2019s Day has always kind […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":19028,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,248],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-views","category-february-19-2020"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19029"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19029\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19030,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19029\/revisions\/19030"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19028"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}