An Old Romantic Custom We Should Bring Back
The best gift you can give your Valentine is reading a poem out loud.
“How to Build a Life” is a column by Arthur Brooks, tackling questions of meaning and happiness. Click here to listen to his podcast series on all things happiness, How to Build a Happy Life.
No holiday exposes the problems with gift-giving quite like Valentine’s Day. On birthdays or Christmas, you might at least find some variety. But on February 14, almost everything on offer is painfully conventional and threatens to degrade the quality of your love. To paraphrase Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love thee as much as $59.99 in flowers purchased on the internet. And such as to stop at the CVS for chocolates on my (Tomorrow my love for thee will be half off, so I might grab more then.)
