Happy Valentines Day!

From Salon:

Each Valentine's Day, like clockwork, well-meaning lovers hoping to woo their sweeties spend a small fortune on roses and cardboard hearts stuffed with chocolates. Even those who'd usually prefer a slice of pizza to steak tartare and jeans to a suit jacket, somehow find themselves dolled up and sharing a candlelit dinner. For a holiday that supposedly celebrates the excitement and passion of love, hasn't it all become rather stale?

Valentine's Day isn't just for preppy, thoroughly non-alterna monogamous heterosexuals. If you want to give roses, chocolate, and a red teddy bear, be my guest. If you want to skip the celebrating and make it any day of the year, do it. If you want to protest the capitalist and heterosexist and sexist elements of the way many Americans celebrate, grab your sign and hit the streets outside Hallmark. But My Amusement Park believes in true love (and the power of "reclaiming".) And true love is nothing if not deeply personalized. So we're going to get you in the mood.

Slate gives you some love poems for the day. May I recommend a few of my favorite love poems by e.e. cummings, Frank O'Hara, and Gertrude Stein.

If you're staying in, allow me to suggest viewing a sampling of some of the all-time best on screen romantic couples, according to MAP:

Brian and Justin; Queer as Folk
Joel and Clementine: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Randy and Evie; The Incredibly True Adventures of True Girls in Love
Isaac and Tracy; Manhattan
Ryan and Marissa, Sandy and Kirsten, Summer and Seth; The OC
David and Sofia; Vanilla Sky
Alvy and Annie; Annie Hall
Nina and Jamie: Truly, Madly, Deeply
Nate and Brenda, David and Keith; Six Feet Under
Ennis and Jack; Brokeback Mountain

My partner, A, already bought me a cappucino this morning on the way to work. But coffee or tea for the connoisseur has that chocolate feel to it, without being as expected. Also, this book offers recipes chock full of dishes which will rack your biochemistry with love.

Some songs to crank on the iPod:

Crimson and Clover: Tommy James and the Shondells OR (queer version) Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
I'm In: Radney Foster w/ Abra Moore
I Only Have Eyes for You: The Flamingos
Save the Last Dance for Me: The Drifters
You Got Me: The Roots featuring Erykah Badu
When It Don't Come Easy: Patty Griffin
I'll Take Care of You: Dixie Chicks
The Folks Who Live on the Hill: Brad Mehldau Trio
Your Love: The Butchies
Mint Car: The Cure
Lazy Days: Leona Naess
Simple: kd lang
All I Want Is You: U2
A Case of You: Joni Mitchell
Let Me Touch You For Awhile: Alison Krauss and Union Station
I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You): Aretha Franklin (remember it in Bound!?)
You Still Believe In Me: The Beach Boys
Oh Yoko: John Lennon

... and many more where those came from!

HRC has a special Valentine's Day page to check out.

And think about why you really love your (specific) loved ones. Today, I love A for being a hard-core feminist, an unabashed softie to my often-times-hardass, an argumentative intellectual, a brave advocate, a careful and thoughtful artist, an ideal challenging and supportive friend, and accepting of me in my geeky-as-hell, pop-culture-loving, politically-correct, insecure macho-ness. I love that we don't have to spend too much money, but we can if we have it, we don't have to make the day the apex of the year, but we can if we want it to be. I love that, for me and A, Valentines Day can belong to us, as a couple, not to us, as part of a world of couples.

Hope you enjoy the day and night, alone, with family or/and friends, or with your partner(s)!