There has long existed a standard playbook for the feast of St. Valentine, at least in the United States. Buy a card for someone you openly (or secretly) admire, maybe paired with some chocolate or flowers. Or there’s the dinner date — a very special episode featuring a coveted table or the culinary inspirations of the couple who home cooks. And for the uncoupled? It’s almost expected to do any of these things, alone or with friends.
Each year, many Bostonians partake in these festivities. But this is — to put it lovingly — a town full of nerds. Its metropolitan area is home to dozens of colleges and tens of thousands of students. And couples that foster a life of the mind, fueled by a dazzling number of interests and niches, may want something more than a plate of puttanesca or a day of wine and roses.
Valentine’s Day falls on a Friday this year, and Knight Moves in Brookline anticipates the board game cafe to be as busy as it would be on any other night — but it’s still leaning into love with a neurodivergent board game speed dating night later in the month.
Museums are also encouraging couples to walk through their doors for a stimulating and experiential date night. The Museum of Illusions Boston is offering a ticketing special for the romantic holiday. Out of the box, yes; but mental trickery, somewhat counterintuitively, may prove a surprising bonding experience.
“The cool thing about illusions [is], generally speaking, everybody sees them differently,” said Stacy Stack, a vice president of the museum’s parent company, LOL Entertainment. “Some people might see an illusion pop before somebody else. It does give you something to talk about. For date nights particularly, it is super engaging and it’s a nice shake up from just going out to a dinner or a movie.”
The Boston Public Library is stretching their Valentine’s vibes throughout the entire month. February saw the return of their Blind Date with a Book program, launched in 2019. The Central Library, Brighton, Mattapan, Roxbury and East Boston branches are all participating. And while the “dating” may be perfectly on theme, the library said there is a greater point to the literary surprises, which are wrapped in brown paper with only short descriptions to help patrons make their selections.
“It is designed to help people stop judging books by their covers and instead get a blind date with a book that will hopefully be their auther perfect match,” explained Veronica Koven-Matasy, the Central Library’s reader services supervisor. “I can’t tell you who the author is. And there’s no cover art to help me sell this book. What would I say about this book that would make you want to read it? It’s a really cool exercise for us as stuff, sometimes difficult. But it’s definitely something that the patrons really engage with.”
