Happy Wednesday! :)
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I'm loving that it is very close to Valentine's day so I'm very excited to share my love of the holiday with all of you! I absolutely love Valentine's day. Whether your single, dating, married, or divorced I think you can celebrate. I love the holiday so much because you can go all-out showing people how much you care for them. Not just your significant other either. Anyone! I love sending cards and balloons to all my friends who "hate" the holiday, just so they can smile a bit that day. Even if your not receiving gifts, they are still fun to give! :)
Another reason I love Valentine's day is simply because of the story of Saint Valentine. In case you've never heard it, here it is!
Let me introduce myself. My name is Valentine. I lived in Rome during the third century. That was long, long ago! At that time, Rome was ruled by an emperor named Claudius. I didn't like Emperor Claudius, and I wasn't the only one! A lot of people shared my feelings.
Claudius wanted to have a big army. He expected men to volunteer to join. Many men just did not want to fight in wars. They did not want to leave their wives and families. As you might have guessed, not many men signed up. This made Claudius furious. So what happened? He had a crazy idea. He thought that if men were not married, they would not mind joining the army. So Claudius decided not to allow any more marriages. Young people thought his new law was cruel. I thought it was preposterous! I certainly wasn't going to support that law!
Did I mention that I was a priest? One of my favourite activities was to marry couples. Even after Emperor Claudius passed his law, I kept on performing marriage ceremonies -- secretly, of course. It was really quite exciting. Imagine a small candlelit room with only the bride and groom and myself. We would whisper the words of the ceremony, listening all the while for the steps of soldiers.
One night, we did hear footsteps. It was scary! Thank goodness the couple I was marrying escaped in time. I was caught. (Not quite as light on my feet as I used to be, I guess.) I was thrown in jail and told that my punishment was death.
I tried to stay cheerful. And do you know what? Wonderful things happened. Many young people came to the jail to visit me. They threw flowers and notes up to my window. They wanted me to know that they, too, believed in love.
One of these young people was the daughter of the prison guard. Her father allowed her to visit me in the cell. Sometimes we would sit and talk for hours. She helped me to keep my spirits up. She agreed that I did the right thing by ignoring the Emperor and going ahead with the secret marriages. On the day I was to die, I left my friend a little note thanking her for her friendship and loyalty. I signed it, "Love from your Valentine."
I believe that note started the custom of exchanging love messages on Valentine's Day. It was written on the day I died, February 14, 269 A.D. Now, every year on this day, people remember. But most importantly, they think about love and friendship. And when they think of Emperor Claudius, they remember how he tried to stand in the way of love, and they laugh -- because they know that love can't be beaten!
For this story and more information on Valentine's day, click
here
I'm loving that Steven and I are taking off this weekend to go back to his hometown. I love it there. We are hoping that after I'm done with this semester of school we can move back there and start looking for new jobs and doing all sorts of other "grown-up" things.
I'm also loving that in May, we are going on vacation with Steven's family! I'm so excited because we are going to Las Vegas! It will be so much fun. I have been to Vegas before but I wasn't 21. It was fun, but I think it will be a lot more fun this time around.
I'm loving that I'm ahead in school! I've been doing homework for what feels like non-stop. So it feels good to be able to have a little time to relax and not worry about it!
As always, I'm loving all your comments! Reading what you guys have to say makes my day! :)
Link up with Jamie and tell us all what you are loving! I hope you have a great Valentine's Day! :)
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