Friday, February 14, 2014

Valentine's Day

Have you seen the Google Doodle for today? It's got six different "love stories", and wishes you "Happy Valentine's Day from the Internet". It's kind of depressing. There's a story about a girl crushing on a guy, with no apparent resolution. A story about a blind date with a TV personality. A story about a middle school relationship that's only been going on for 20 minutes, a story about a first kiss that didn't happen, and two stories about post-wedding day blues. Is this the best love the Internet has to offer?

On ABC's "The Chew" last week, they had a a brief discussion about millennials looking for their soul mates. With the exception of Michael Simon, the hosts all pointed out that they don't really believe in soul mates, but rather that someone grows with you and becomes your soul mate (at which point even Michael admitted he and his wife had been friends for a while first).

I think this is a big part of what Google is doing with it's sad candy hearts. It's kind of a "truth-about-love" idea. Which is a little sad, honestly. We've taken love to the Cinderella immediacy extreme, so now we have to balance it with the "oh-it's-fleeting" side?

I don't really know quite why I don't like the Google Valentine Doodle, but I don't - what do you think?