I hate Valentine’s Day with the burning fire of a thousand suns. I didn’t always feel this way. When I was a small child, I saw it as an occasion to be spoiled with chocolate and parties in school. Around about fifth grade, I began noticing that my stack of Valentines was always smaller than everyone else’s, and after that the “holiday” became a negative day, fraught with anxiety. Instead of being a day where you find out how much you are loved, it became a day to find out you are not loved. It sucks. Only twice has a partner made the slightest attempt to live up to the hype. The first time, a version of which I related in The Playground , my psychotic boyfriend Chris gave me a fake Tiffany charm bracelet on sale for $8.95 at Macy’s. I would have been thril...