Balendine's Big Chance--A Valentine's Day origin story (sort of)

Balendine was a poor simple goatherd who lived on the idyllic island of Amore Bizzarro. One day he happened to see the cheesemaker’s daughter in the village and instantly fell in love. Her name was Bruttastrega, a flaxen-haired, bosomy maiden whose lovely cleft chin reminded Balendine of the flanks of the kids he tended. Alas, his position as goatherd was too lowly to ever give him any hope of being wed to a woman of her breeding. So he set in motion a plan to change his identity and win her hand.

He stole away to the local leper colony to seek the wisdom of the sages.

“How can a simple goatherd like me entice such a refined, perfect maiden such as Bruttastrega?” he beseeched them.

The oldest leper told him, “First, you must master the art of scent allure.” And the old leper took him to the woods and there taught him how to brew powerful potions from the bark of elms and the urine of black bears, from the plump orange nasenberries and the most delicate of mountain flowers. Soon he could make nearly any scent he could dream up.

“But how will I know which scent suits her tastes best?” he asked.

“This is easy,” the elder leper assured him. “You must wait outside her cottage until she appears. Then follow her to the first place she goes. There you will find the main ingredient for the unique concoction you seek.”

So Balendine did as the old man said. He waited until the new moon so that he could spot the maiden when she appeared. Nigh on midnight the door of her father’s cottage opened and she appeared in all her bucolic beauty. He watched her emerge with fretful anticipation. She moved first in the direction of the outhouse, which the young man watched and held his breath, imagining the putrid task that might lie ahead for him. But, mercifully, at the last minute she changed course and made her way towards the henhouse.

At this Balendine scratched his head, wondering what kind of bloody sacrifice he would have to make for love’s sake. Then, once more, the maiden veered in a new direction, seemingly distracted by something in the nearby bushes. In the moonlight he watched as she bent down and picked up a big, bright, round melon, a honeydew that had been ripening all day in the early autumn sun.

With both hands she brought the melon to her face and sniff sniff snifffffed in big, thirsty whiffs the fragrant melon. Then the maiden sighed a sigh of pleasure and made her way brusquely to the outhouse. Balendine dutifully noted the honeydew melon and stole away under cover of darkness, back to the leper colony.

Over the next few days and weeks he brewed a perfume that smelled so strongly of honeydew that it could be said to be the selfsame scent, but somehow superior in every way. For it was infused with love and care, tended to by the young goatherd, overseen by men who love and lust as every man does, but whose dreams vanish when the light of day hits their fetid flesh.

When the potion was complete, the old leper told Balendine of his next task. If he was going to woo the young maiden properly, he would have to look the part of upstanding gentleman. So they ventured off together to the local H&M Department Store and bought a smashing three-piece suit with a double-breasted sport-coat by Versace and a silk tie by Ralph Lauren. They spent almost the entire sum of Balendine’s savings, a pittance indeed. But in the end he looked quite dapper and both men agreed that the colors really brought out his best feature, which were his olive-colored eyes. Then they shared a giant cinnamon roll at Cinnabon and tarried in the mall no further.

They returned to the colony tired and satisfied. But there was still one more task to complete. The old leper (whose name, incidentally, was Donald, but most people called him “Don” or even “Donny” if they knew him really well) told Balendine of the grave news: the last task would require untold amounts of courage and fortitude. For if he was to truly win the heart of the brutishly handsome Bruttastrega and make her his betrothed, he would need to bring her a gift that was unique, one that could not be found anywhere on the island.

The lepers, being hermits out of social necessity, had vast amounts of time on their hands. And owing to the Christian missionaries who came to transform them from mere creatures into creatures of God, they had been bequeathed vast stores of knowledge and esoterica in the form of books and scrolls from as far away as India, Peru and Kakamundambi…..ninihubu. And from this library they had discovered the final, universal secret to a woman’s heart: a mysterious substance known as “cho-co-lat-e”.

Because co-co-a is the most important ingredient in cho-co-lat-e, and since there was no such substance to be found in the entire region, the lepers all concurred that Balendine must set off on a search around the world for the necessary ingredients. It would be perilous, it might even be fatal. But he was willing to endure any hardship to win the hand of the aberrantly-formed Bruttastrega.

And so he set forth on the high seas, stowing away in the ship of a Pashtu rug merchant. He traveled all the oceans, set foot on every continent, ate at a McDonald’s in every major port in the known world. And after months and then years, and then some more weeks and days thrown in for good measure, he arrived back in Amore Bizzarro a changed man. He bore an air of stateliness, worldliness, majesty, debauchery, so that no woman could possibly refuse him. But his heart was true and his aim was unwavering. He still wanted none other than that bandy-kneed cheesemaker’s daughter.

At this time one could feel the beginnings of spring. The snows on the mountaintops had begun to melt, building from small fountainheads into a torrential spring. And around the spring water, life exploded in multiform splendor. Primordial forest deer drank from fresh pools in the glens. Birds of every color chirped their joyous songs in chorus around him. He inhaled the fresh sea air of his island and thanked mother-life for the bounties he now was blessed to behold.

Through nature’s gorgeousity Balendine marched. Through forest paths he skipped, making his way to the leper colony one last time to gather sage wisdom from the old leper Donny and prepare for his meeting with the truculently-drawn Bruttastrega, apple of his eye.

When he reached the walls of the colony he was greeted by many lepers, old and young. But nowhere among them was Donny. With long faces and heavy hearts the others told the young man of Donald’s passing. Balendine felt as if he had been struck by a heavy blow in his soul. In fact he had been struck, very coincidentally to the scene, that very moment in the chest by an arrow that had missed its target. And as the lepers crowded around the young goatherd-cum-world traveler passed out cold upon the ground, a young neophyte came forward clutching a bow to his chest and apologizing profusely for his stupid, careless mistake.

“I am remorseful and ashamed beyond measure,” he cried, and knelt on the earth to receive his punishment.

As fate would have it, the young leper had of late been experimenting with a new chemical substance that would make the arrow fly truer to its course. This substance he applied to the tip of the arrow. It seemed as though the arrow had indeed found its course.

“Cupid!” the others cried. “How could you be so stupid?”

But as the lepers began to admonish poor Cupid, Balendine sat up, quick as lightening, in a frenzied daze with stars pirouetting around his head. With a broad grin on his face he grabbed Cupid by the hand and helped him up, slapping his back to give him good cheer.

To the others he said, “And now, friends, I’m off. And I’ve never felt better in all my days. True love has finally brought me to my senses.” And he grabbed the box of cho-co-lat-es, plucked a nosegay of flowers in one quick movement, spritzed himself with honeydew perfume, dusted off his gabardine suit and started off for his love. But before he could go more than a few paces, someone called his name.

“Just ohn ohnent, young nan.” It was Sir Winston Hallmark, the unfortunate knight whose lips had begun to rot away the week after his knighting. “Here is a nessage od addectation I had hrehrared hor you. Id you hind yoursel unadle to exhress your heelings in oerds, use nine.”

What he meant to say was this: “Here is a message of affectation I have prepared for you. If you find yourself unable to express your feelings in words, use mine.” It was a splendid gesture and Balendine thanked him heartily. He read the hand-made card out loud (and it was a true example of affectation):

Roses are red
Melons are green
You’ve got quite a pair
If you know what I mean

I tend to the goats
You were brought up on cheese
Let’s both sow our oats
This eve, if you please

Reading this brought tears to young Balendine’s eyes, so overjoyed was he at the splendid form and message. For you see, on Amore Bizzarro, the coarsest and most vulgar speech is considered the most endearing. So you can imagine the effect that such a lovely card and poem would have on the young maiden’s heart. And as a finishing touch, Sir Winston Hallmark had drawn on the front of the card, in stunning detail, a very large phallus ensconced by red hearts.

And so our young hero marched down into the valley, a proud man on a mission of love. When he came to the door of the maiden, he knocked the customary three knocks and waited. His hands sweated as he adjusted his collar and readied the card and cho-co-lat-es. An old man came to the door and looked him up and down fully the customary three times before shouting for his daughter.

“Brutta,” he cried. “A handsome suitor is here to see you.”

A minute later the young maiden appeared. She looked so absolutely execrable with her noisome hair and corrugated hindquarters that Balendine let out an audible gasp of wonder and delight before bending down on one knee, taking her hand in his, and kissing it with all the fervency of a religious pilgrim arriving at the most venerated of shrines.

And what became of the two young would-be lovers? Well that, my friends, is impossible for me to tell. For you see, today is Valentine’s Day and as of yet their date is not come to an end. We can only hope for our hero’s sake that the flowers, the cho-co-lat-es, the perfume, the suit, and the card were worth the effort for our young lovelorn friend.

But as the lepers neglected to tell our hero, material things are no guarantee of requited love. And Valentine’s Day is one day of the year that most men are promised a sure chance at abject failure.

So let’s drink a toast to love and romance,
To flowers and chocolates and cheese and goats.
But let’s not forget that love has no chance
Without sweat, persistence and randy notes.

Happy Balendine’s Day!!

Love,

~Kevin