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Monday, February 14, 2005 What's in a name? Happy Valentine’s Day. Or is it Valentines Day? A quick survey on the web shows no easy consensus. Perhaps it’s the English major in me, but the apostrophe is important: with the former spelling, the day belongs to its patron saint, Valentine, who apparently performed marriages for lovers when Claudius II had outlawed marriage for young men (he believed they would be better soldiers if they were single). Other stories suggest that what he actually did was help Christians escape from certain torture in Roman prisons. Or perhaps the possessive has nothing to do with Valentine at all: perhaps it refers to the object of one’s affections, the valentine of the day. Then again, there’s the possibility that the latter is the correct spelling, entirely sans apostrophe. In that case, today is the day of valentines, whether human (the cute girl next to you in the computer lab) or not (those paper things you passed out in second grade). The day would thus belong to no one, although it would honor whatever you call a valentine. Or as my roommate Mara says, perhaps the entire name is wrong: it’s Single People Awareness Day. ^ Top | 12:57 PM | | | 
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