It’s February 29, Leap Year Day. That extra day we get every four years, or so, because no one has quite figured out how to get a calendar to work.
The problem is, in order to fix it, we would probably have to make a second just a little bit longer and the inner workings of every clock would then have to be adjusted. The three hundred sixty-five day year is too short by six hours, nine minutes and nine seconds. Roughly.
Julius Caesar mandated leap days in 46 B.C.E. to try to keep his calendar in line. Although not everyone followed the custom. When Pope Gregory brought in his calendar to try tom fix problems with the Julian calendar, it still wouldn’t work quite right, and when Easter started getting close to some pagan holidays, something had to be done. So let’s stick another day in there. Not every year. Just every four years. Except on century years. Century years have to be divisible by four hundred to be a leap year.
Seriously, this was long enough ago that no one had a watch or a reliable clock for that matter. You would think they could have come up with a better solution. But it sort of works, as awkward as it is.
For those who follow the lunar new year, you have to stick in an extra month every three years or so to try to get it to match up. And during the reign of Stalin, the Soviet’s tried to solve the problem with thirty day months, five day weeks and no weekends. Can’t see that being very popular.
There are a few interesting traditions that had sprung up over the years. Long before Al Capp invented Sadie Hawkins Day, the Irish had a day when women could ask men to marry them, rather than the other way around. Apparently, St. Brigid made a deal with St. Patrick that every leap year day, women could propose to men. That tradition spread to other countries, and there were penalties for men who said no to a proposal. You could be forced to buy the woman enough material for a new dress. Or forced to buy her twelve pairs of new gloves, so she could hide the shame of not having a ring on her finger.
In Scotland, the tradition apparently also demanded that the woman doing the asking had to wear a red petticoat. Almost seems to be an unfair distraction in some ways.
While getting engaged on leap year day might have been okay, in several countries, getting married on leap year day was considered to be unlucky and could possibly lead to divorce and not finding love at all in your life.
In Taiwan, daughters are supposed to return home to cook pig trotter noodles for their parents for luck. It is thought the elderly are more likely to die on a leap year, but pig’s feet and noodles will being them good luck and good health.
It you’re in France, you could even check the answers to that crossword puzzle from four years ago. La Bougie du Sapeur is a satirical newspaper that is published only on leap year days. And yes, they have a crossword puzzle. Just don’t be in a hurry to check those answers.
There’s even a leap day cocktail that was developed at the Savoy Hotel in London in 1928. Gin, Grand Marnier, vermouth and lemon juice. And the Leap Year Festival in Anthony, Texas.
For many of us, it might be just another day. But if you happen to be an unmarried male, you might want just stay home until tomorrow. At least if you want to stay unmarried.
For me, just pass the pig’s feet. And I might need one of those cocktails.