It only happens every four years and it seems like magic! It’s called Leap Day! Though our calendars show 365 days in a year, it actually takes about 365.2421 days for the earth to orbit the sun. Every four years we add an extra day to the calendar to make sure that our calendars stay in synch with the true astronomical year and to make up the lost time.
Of course, any phenomena such as a day that only happens once every four years can only mean one thing…a reason to party! And naturally, historically speaking, Leap Day partying is a thing. Most of us know it as Sadie Hawkins, or the one dance of the year where it is customary for women to ask men to dance.
According to History.com: “Tradition holds that in 5th-century Ireland, St. Bridget lamented to St. Patrick that women were not allowed to propose marriage to men. So legend has it that St. Patrick designated the only day that does not occur annually, February 29, as a day on which women would be allowed to propose to men. In some places, Leap Day thus became known as Bachelor’s Day. This tradition hopped the Irish Sea to Scotland and England, where the British added a twist—if a man rejected a woman’s proposal, he owed her a debt of several pairs of fine gloves, perhaps to hide the fact that she did not have an engagement ring.”
Time Magazine explains that Sadie Hawkins “hit the U.S. pop cultural shores back in 1937, when Sadie Hawkins Day was introduced in pen and ink in Al Capp’s classic comic strip Li’l Abner. In the comic, Sadie Hawkins was a spinster at the age of 35, so her father set up a race for local bachelors. Whoever Sadie caught was going to be her husband. The town, and the reading audience, loved the idea and the race became an annual fixture of the comic strip, and soon spread into real-life society, spawning Sadie Hawkins Day dances.”
Ok so the idea is a little antiquated and Arthur Murray ladies don’t wait for a particular day to wait to ask to go dancing…but hey, any excuse to dance is ok by us! Whoever you choose to dance with, and whatever you want to give as your reason for celebrating, we hope you’ll make your way to our Friday night party, grab a partner, hit the dance floor…and party like it isn’t going to be March tomorrow!
