Leap Day has a tradition going far, far back in time. In ancient Sumeria, it was considered a day for taking chances–for doing things normally considered too risky, such as entering a hitherto unexplored cave, descending a steep cliff, or making wisecracks to airport security. The Aztecs celebrated leap day with drunken revelry and corset piercings. To the Hunnish tribes, it was a day for telling long jokes that always ended, “That’s what the horse said.” The ancient Celts saw it a time when the barriers to faerie were thin, so they would engage in religious rites at stone circles in which they would ask the gods to please give them a better calender. The magyars saw it as a day for eating fine food and having wild, abandoned sex–in other words, they didn’t take particular note of it.
Today, our celebrations are more sedate, and we usually use it as an opportunity to make fun of a certain class of neo-pagan and for making things up out of whole cloth.
The Hungarians seem to have it right… but I may be biased in that opinion as both my dad’s parents were born in Hungary. My grandfather drank and my grandmother cooked. No one mentioned anything about sex.
I may celebrate if Winnipeg earns a spot on the new International Monopoly Board. It would be ironic if a city, whose civic council reflects the ideals of the 1950’s should replace Baltic Ave as one of Monolpoly’s rundown streets. (this is a good point to listen to the Weakerthans sing ‘One Great City’. I don’t put links into other peoples blogs so you will have to look it up if you are interested).
Don@1: Out of curiousity, why don’t you link to others’ blogs? I can understand in specific instances where you don’t want to encourage traffic to a site you disagree with, but why as a general rule?
It it hard for me to explain as words are not always my strong point, though I am not much better with pictures. I feel I am intruding somehow or that I will link someone to a site that is not safe without realizing it*. Also I do not always understand the rules of ettiquette in different situations and I rather err on the side of caution. Whether I succeed or not is another story.
I guess it sounds dopey but I have only been using LJ and reading blogs for a few months and I have a tendency to put my foot in my mouth or to misunderstand the social conventions of others so I prefer to be cautious.
*I am willing to take that risk on my own blog but not others, unless I know the people really well.
“In ancient Sumeria, it was considered a day for taking chances–for doing things normally considered too risky, such as entering a hitherto unexplored cave, descending a steep cliff, or making wisecracks to airport security.”
I got married on Friday. That’s scarier than any cave or cliff you could throw me into or over, but not quite as bad as airport security.
Congratulations!
Thank you! It was a really great day.
I brave airport security next week (coming into the US), so all of my bases are covered for this month.