By: Gabrielle Guzinski
Scientists measure a day on how long it takes Earth to spin once on its axis, which is twenty-four hours. We measure a calendar year on how long it takes Earth to orbit the Sun, “365.2421 days to be precise”, as outlined by biglanguage.com. Making it a quarter of a day longer, overtime which adds up to a full day every four years. To keep everything in sync this is added to the shortest month of the calendar, February. The 2024 leap year will fall on February 29, 2024.
Ever since the existence of humans, we have been fascinated by making a structure for our society to be supported for daily life. The first known occurrence of creating a calendar, according to britannica.com was, “...the Egyptians invented a schematized civil year of 365 days divided into three seasons, each of which consisted of four months of 30 days each. To complete the year, five intercalary days were added at its end so that the 12 months were equal to 360 days plus five extra days.” This was to build a system centered around farming, cultural celebrations, lunar phases, and much more. Documentation was very important to Egyptians to keep track of significant events, for example, to prepare for the harvests every year and it is known to the world as one of the most significant early human communities.
As civilizations across the globe began to develop, they soon began to realize that typical periods were not lining up like they should be. As stated by kids.nationalgeographic.com, “In the 16th century, major dates and holidays had drifted by 10 days. In Rome, Pope Gregory XIII unveiled his Gregorian calendar in 1582. That year, he dropped 10 days from October to sync things back up. He also developed a new leap year system that used the solar year of 365.2422 days, added one leap day every four years, but dropped three leap days every 400 years to keep the calendars from drifting.” Due to this beneficial change, this is what we use in today’s modern world and time which is used across all digital and paper planners alike to help you, along with the rest of humanity, to stay on track.
From there, traditions seemed to arise from this rare event that fascinated many by curious nature. This is a global phenomenon that has been going on for centuries or even recently in the past fifty years, as declared by salon.com, “In February 1988, the town of Anthony, Texas, declared itself “leap year capital of the world” thanks to Mary Ann Brown and Birdie Lewis. Brown and Lewis, who were both born on Leap Day, proposed a festival to celebrate the unique day. The four-day-long shindig remains a popular attraction today, with folks from all over the world traveling to Texas to enjoy live music, good food, and endless fun.” In Europe, specifically Ireland, according to civitatis.com, “Leap Day was a day when women were allowed to propose to a man if he was taking too long to pop the question. According to legend, Saint Brigid struck a deal with Saint Patrick in the 5th century on behalf of all the women waiting for their partner to propose. Saint Patrick agreed that women would be allowed to propose once every four years, which still seems unfair! By the 1800s this tradition was well established, as were some requirements for what a man would need to do should he refuse. If you intended said no, he would be required to purchase gloves, a silk gown, or a fur coat in the 20th century.” Nowadays anyone can propose, but it is amazing to look back and see how far we have progressed in beating social norms.
With there being one extra day this year, that leads to the question of what you will be doing for that extra twenty-four hours that you only get once every four years. Here in hopes to seize the day and enjoy the moment because a day like this is special yet celebratory when it comes to the uniqueness of our planet, Earth. Not only do the seasons become aligned because of this occurrence, but as a society, we show that we are rotating properly on our axis as well and ready for the next leap year to commence.