We have an extra day in our calendars this year, and it’s today, Monday, Feb. 29. If you’re curious about your extra day this week, or simply want some explanation as to why we have this day, you’re in the right place.
The original attempt at figuring out what to do with the time caused by the Earth’s rotations slowing by about two thousandths of a second per day failed. The Roman calendar had “355 days with an extra 22-day month every two years,” but Julius Caesar wanted a better system implemented when he became emperor. You can read more about our old, confusing calendar here. Luckily, the new way to accurately measure time was so successful it stuck—and is supposed to for the next 10,000 years, until the slowing time catches up with us again. Many people think that Leap Year is so effective because there are exactly 365.25 days in the year, but this is incorrect because of the constant and slight change that happens with the seconds every four years. But the science and history behind Leap Year are not the only intriguing parts of this special day, there are other ideas that come up for debate every four years when it rolls around.
For people that receive pay on an annual basis, because Leap Day is not a holiday, they technically work an extra day without pay every four years of their career. Unsurprisingly, this is cause for upset to many people. In recent years, some have argued to make Feb. 29 a bank holiday, and in 2008, a high school teacher from Maryland pushed the "No Work on Leap Day Revolution" because the 29th of February fell on a Friday that year. Sadly for most of us, his movement has not been recognized on a large scale. We will be celebrating our extra day by studying for midterms and having an extra Monday before spring break.
My personal favorite concept of Leap Year is people born on Feb. 29. Only one in 1,461 people are born on Leap Day, making it an extremely rare birthday celebration for two reasons. The odds are not in your favor, and your special day only rolls around once every four years. If your birthday happens every four years, how old are you really? Of course, you age normally, but by the time you are supposed to be 20, you are really only five years old. This begs the question, should these people be celebrating their birthday parties with princesses and superheroes or going out to dinner with their friends and celebrating a normal pretend birthday? (Whatever that means.) However they choose to celebrate, if you know someone whose birthday is Feb. 29, you should go out of your way to make them feel extra special. Here's an idea of how to help them choose to celebrate on the right day for the other three years.
No matter what you choose to do with your extra day this week, at least now you know more about peculiar Feb. 29.
