According to the Oxford English Dictionary, short version, romance is pretty much a lie, a fantasy, a dressed-up fib, a story, a ‘wild and wanton’ exaggeration. The OED doesn’t have much romance in its soul, it seems. Perhaps it reserves more sentimental verbiage for the more expensive and esoteric long version. It seems to intimate that ‘romance’ can be cheerfully exchanged for ‘prevarication’ without modification, although usually for an attractive lie: “a picturesque falsehood, an extravagent fiction." The quotes chosen to illustrate the word are of a dour, nay, even sour nature: “Romance goes out of a man’s head when the hair gets grey”; “This is romance. I’ll not believe a word on’t.” Under “Romancer” we find “a fantastic liar”. The man who wrote that entry (and it can be no other for this dictionary) and chose those quotations we can be sure had some traumatic experiences in the love department, poor baby.

It is worth noting that the American College Dictionary, while reluctantly mentioning the falsehoods of Romance, emphasizes "marvelous achievements" and "love affairs". One might well be proud to be an American on St.Valentine’s Day, it seems, although the internet search engine I consulted seems to go on and on about the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, about which I should have assumed we prefer to forget.

The saint for whom the celebration was named was perhaps a fable himself, in spite of his appearance in the Columbia Encyclopedia, circa 1950. The Columbia Encyclopedia says our beloved saint (listed under Valentine, St) died around 270 as a Roman martyr priest and it cautiously suggests that the customs we celebrate in his honor are "probably a survival from a period when a pagan festival associated with love occurred about February 14". We can be fairly sure that the hearts, flowers, and birds commonly used on greeting cards are associated with that pagan festival.

Apparently birds, especially, are supposed to begin mating around that date, though here in the North, most of the birds haven’t arrived from the South yet, and those that have are much too cold to organize anything romantic, except perhaps the wild turkeys, who, having survived Thanksgiving, might still be cavorting in the forests under the shrubbery.

The association of hearts...well, those pagan rituals, I’m afraid, involved some pretty nasty doings, including, according, again, to the History Channel, boys waving, I’m sorry, bloody strips of goatskin around with which they “gently slapped women and fields of crops.” Eeeew! This festival, known as the Lupercalia, honored either or both of Juno, queen of the gods, or Faunus, the Roman god of agriculture and carrying on.

The history channel seems to have some charming stories about St. Valentine, including a story of his sending a Valentine to his jailor’s daughter, and/or marrying a lot of couples who had been forbidden to marry, but the stories are suspiciously slanted toward greeting cards with a credit line for a greeting card company attached. There could be a bit of special interest involved. It is much more likely that poor Valentine, if he ever existed, was martyed for refusing to knuckle under Claudius the Cruel and their quarrel had nothing to do with love.

So Saint Valentine, his details murky, his existence in doubt, his martyrdom undoubtedly painful, since he either died in jail of a fever or was beaten with clubs and/or decapitated, and his association with the Lupercalia no doubt scandalous to the old saint, does have additional one bit of authentic romance attached to his name. In 1835, carried away by the passion of a sermon delivered by one Father John Spratt, Pope Gregory XVI gave what was left of St. Valentine, to the good Father. You can see the gift box, a truly splendid Valentine present if you will, in the Whitefriar Street Church in Dublin, Ireland. According to the History Channel. Of course, it is very unlikely that there are any bits of saintly DNA in that box. 270 was a long time ago. But it is a nice, quite romantic story. Though lacking somewhat in the feminine angle, the tale of the Pope and the Irish priest (note he is not a cardinal or bishop or anything, just a (perhaps) humble priest) and the Valentine present has all the elements of a truly romantic story. It is as good as Jane Eyre. Claudius the Cruel can play the part of the madwoman in the attic. In every truly romantic story there must be a madwoman in the attic and an extravagant gesture. Surely, with a flourish and a marvelous speech, the Pope must have bestowed the most fabulous Valentine present of all time!

I have, though, some marvelous valentines in my possession, the valentines his classmates gave my father when he was in first or second grade. Sentimental, signed with love by all the little classmates whether male or female with innocent enthusiasm, these small cards carry the glamour of the past. The years they have sat around since the 1920’s have given them a romance they surely never carried when they were new. Love to William from Perry, from Maude, from Emma, from Jack, from Esther. Inheriting a batch of Valentines is not a bad way to guarantee a moment or two of genuine romance. Leafing through old love letters of one’s own is, perhaps, a less comfortable way of celebrating the saint’s day, depending on the quality of one’s correspondents. The stories of the past, with lies embedded, can certainly help trigger the sentimental attack said to be cured only by chocolate, which may be sent to one by one’s loved ones. Or bought in one’s local grocery store, on the sly, for oneself, among a dizzying array of red-wrapped boxes of candies and bins of stuffed bears.

Even after all this research, I can still only reply that I know romance when I see it. Even though I haven’t had much experience of romance myself, or at least as much as I might have hoped, I know what it is supposed to look like. I read books, lots of books, and lots of them have romantic elements. Even Hemingway. However, I must agree with the OED that the romantic gesture is frequently accompanied by an untruth. “You, my dear, are the most beautiful woman/man/dog/manatee in the world”... is this ever, strictly, the truth? Does the truth, in such cases, really matter?

The OED goes on to define “Valentine” as “a person of the opposite sex chosen, drawn by lot, or otherwise determined, on St. Valentine’s day, as a sweetheart, lover, or special friend for the ensuing year”. Now, there, the OED brushes closer to the meaning of romance as it pertains to Valentine’s Day: the phrases “drawn by lot” or, even better, “otherwise determined” are certainly more romantic than the OED intended. The Roman festival recognized the drawing of lots as a perfectly good way of pairing the offspring. Let the boys and girls run around together for a year or so and maybe they will get married someday. Or not. The element of chance surely enters into the procedure even now. The choice of a mate, for birds and wolves, people and manatees depends upon accidents of proximity and fate, accidents of that unexpected glow, that unbidden rush of impractical, surprising attraction to an unsuitable or perfectly appropriate partner, in a familiar or in a foreign garden.

And, perhaps, on the occasional well-framed and beautifully polished fib delivered with a dozen roses.