Barefoot in the dark night’s waning hours, I open the curtains on the back door, and I see, to my great surprise, a layer of snow.
It is not so deep, that snow, that grass can’t push its prickly shoots up and over the top of the unexpected blanket. But the driveway is covered. Neighborhood cars parked in other driveways, unprotected, have layers of fluff, and for the umpteenth time, I send up fervent thanks for the fact of having a carport, of not having to scrape and brush the morning car.
Just for fun, I look up school closings on my IPad, and I see that every school in the county is closed today. Closed for .6 of an inch of snow! We chuckle about this, Mark and I, children of the Snowbelt, where we walked to school, several miles, through six foot drifts, all winter long. (It was uphill, both ways, too.)
“We don’t need no stinkin’ snow day!” we snort. “This is nuthin’!”
But, of course, we realize our county does not have the arsenal of snow removal equipment that our old home did, equipment that was geared up and roaring to wipe streets clean when the first flake fluttered to earth.
And there are kids here who live way out on country roads, which can be slick and dangerous, especially if there’s ice underneath that sweet white topping.
And today’s snow was completely unexpected. (No way that fat little groundhog is going to like what it sees.)
The truth is, one just never knows. And that’s February for me, in a nutshell.
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January slid quickly away, dragging, as it went, the last clingy scraps of a cozy holiday season. Even the little park’s decorations are down; the gazebo is back to its placid, wooden state: sparkling tree gone from its center, no greens and icicle lights dripping from its eaves. Now it’s just a summer shelter shouldering on through February.
February is the month, I am told, in which the heaviest snow falls. But it’s also the month when spring weather pops up. My phone weather app tells me we will have REALLY cold weather this weekend.
But then, by the following Thursday, the temps will soar up to fifty degrees Fahrenheit.
That’s February: we’ll figure it out, each day as it comes.
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Some months have names that make sense, in a way. Like the fall months, leading into winter, have counting names—sept, octo, novo, dec. Those might not correspond to the way we count months NOW, but still—how the months earned those names? I get it.
And I can see why January is named for Janus, the god of comings and goings.
But where the heck did the name ‘February’ come from? (It’s the toughest one to learn, some tongues wanting to say FebYOUary instead of FebBREWary. My young tongue, in fact, took a while to wrap around the right way to say it; I remember being corrected. I remember trying to remember to enunciate that ‘r’.)
I look February up on etymonline.com, and this is what I learn:
February was the final month in the Roman calendar, and the Roman feast of purification took place then. And that’s where the name comes from: “februarius menses”—-the month of purification. The root verb is februare: to purify.
So February is the month of purification?
But then, etymonline.com tells me, in Old England, February was called Solmonao.
That meant “mud month.”
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Mud month indeed! The ice melts and the mud softens, clinging to boots and shoes. It creeps into the house. I wield the damp mop five or six times a day, wiping out foot records of comings and goings.
The cars are spattered.
Lawns look tired, disheveled, and worn, their dead leaves anchored in mud.
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John Lawless submitted this poem to Standard Contest 70 in February 2018 (poetrysoup.com):
February Feints
February creeps across the mud
chuckling
knowing it is not her milieu
snickering
as she tats snowflakes
whistling
as she scatters them
icily
on freshly chilled winds.
February veers—from frozen ground dotted with those tatted snowflakes to mud bogs waiting to suck me in. It brings snow days and it brings days when a winter jacket is just too warm, when kids shrill in school playgrounds.
I find, searching online, that there are lots of February poems, and most of them zero in on weather.
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But Valentines Day—that brings emotional warmth, in honor, Britannia.com tells me, of a saint with foggy facts. St. Valentine died in the third century in Rome. He’s not, anymore, a SAINT saint, our Valentine: the Roman Catholic Church decided in 1969 that they just didn’t have enough hard data about the man to sanctify him.
Still, people call Valentine the patron saint of beekeepers, epileptics, and lovers.
Some say Valentine was a Roman doctor and a Catholic priest who became the patron of lovers because he courageously married couples in secret. The government wanted those men single—then they could be sent to war. But married, they were excused; they could stay with their beloved wives.
Or perhaps another story is true—that, imprisoned (maybe for performing those marriages), the saint befriended the jailer’s daughter. She was a blind girl, but Valentine, whether by miracle or medicine, cured her of her blindness. And he would write her missives from his cell, signing them, “…from your Valentine.”
History’s hazy—are either of those stories true? It does seem pretty clear that Valentine was martyred and that his feast day is February 14. That’s a day young students prepare for by crafting fancy boxes in which to carry home all the sweet or funny cards their classmates will give them. They prepare, too, some of them, by being forcibly plunked down at the family table, given a pen, a class list, and a box of Valentines; a stern adult, arms crossed, stands there while the muttering, disgruntled child fills out a Valentine for each and every classmate.
More carping there than Cupid. Oh, well.
Valentines Day is a day for special cards for moms and grams, for salted chocolate caramels packed in shiny cardboard hearts, for a big bouquet of fragrant roses, a day for feting sweethearts.
Unless…it’s not. Uncoupled women took matters into their own hands one year; Merriam-webster.com notes that Parks and Recreation’s Leslie Knope coined the term Galantine in 2010. Women who did not have frenzied Galahads to bring them flowers and chocolate co-opted the day; they celebrated with girlfriends, buying their OWN special gifts: Galantines Day. And so there to the idea that couple-ness is the only state to be celebrated, some might say.
Merriam-Webster-webster.com notes that the Galentine holiday has been dunned for its lack of inclusivity, its embrace only of single women (Is there a Palentine?), but, the site says, there are efforts to address that issue.The writer uses the passive voice, though…efforts are afoot…and so we don’t know what efforts, or who might be making them.
But anyway: valentines and galentines: February.
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“Would you help me,” James asks on the afternoon of February 1, “get my monthly finances in order?”
“Sure,” I say, and he makes room for a chair by his laptop. He creates a fancy table onscreen with spaces for Resources, Expenses, and Other.
Under expenses, he lists his regular expenses, the streaming subscriptions he supports, the practical things he needs to pay for this month: haircut, new socks, prescription drugs, supplements.
He puts down his monthly income; he writes what he knows is coming in, and then he slants his eyes at me.
“Do we KNOW,” he asks delicately, “if you and dad will give me CASH for my birthday?”
Hah. No wonder he wanted my help.
To solve that mystery, I say, we will have to arrive at the great day itself.
Jim sighs and starts a wish list, just in case that birthday cash appears.
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A rare and varied list of February birthdays awaits me at birthdayhub.com. Such notables as Ronald Reagan (and OTHER presidents, of course, who give us a snug day off) and Charles Lindbergh were born in February; so were Rick James and Tommy Smothers. Mary Chapin Carpenter and Laura Ingalls Wilder flaunt their three-name names in the list; Rihanna flounces by with only one. Clark Gable, Cybill Shepherd, Yoko Ono; Sidney Poitier, Erma Bombeck, and Johnny Cash. Babe Ruth. Jules Verne. Roberta Flack (about whom there is, this month, a PBS documentary airing).
Josh Groban.
One of my favorites: George Thorogood.
And closer to home our godson Philip, our grandniece Maddie, our friends Patty, Pam, and Wendy.
And James of course.
And some other wonderful people. You know who you are.
All kinds of interesting personalities were born in February, that shifting, changing, fascinating month.
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James and I take a little trip to the craft store, looking for bouncing bears and wrapping ribbon, and I come upon a sale: all Valentines supplies are marked down 40 per cent. So, unable to resist, I come home with a floppy set of silicone cupcake molds, heart-shaped. At the register, the clerk asks, “Have you ever baked with these before?”
She is, perhaps, a little older, even, than I. She looks disapproving.
I have not used silicone baking pans, I tell her, then ask, “Have you?”
No, she says, a little grim. She likes metal pans.
I get her: it seems impossible to me that this floppy, rubbery substance won’t melt in the oven. But I have in mind small heart-shaped cakes, frosted with white buttercream. Then, I will dig out my fancy frosting tips and bags, and add white flowers and squiggles and dots. Sweet little Valentine’s Day goodies.
Maybe. If the silicone doesn’t melt. We will see.
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I stop at the library to pick up a book on reserve.
Margaret, the wonderful library associate, checks it out for me. She hands me the receipt with a flourish.
“It’s due,” she says, “March 2. And I hope that comes soon. I can’t wait to see the end of February.”
She waves and turns to the next borrower in line, so I don’t get to ask: what’s wrong with February? The weather? All that emphasis on hearts and flowers? Something to do that’s worthy of dread?
Or maybe it’s just the paradox of the month itself: month of purity, month of mud…of Valentine’s chocolate-y excess and Ash Wednesday’s stringent fasting.
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The month that joggles me along, teasing me, unwilling to let me know just what I can expect: February. Here it is, though; might as well jump in.