February's longer than usual this year. OK, OK ... it's longer than usual every four years. But, in my mind, leap years are nothing special: they're just a way to organize our precious calanders so that the appear to function. The sun revolves around the earth as it always has and how we mark those revolutions has changed throughout the millennia, but who cares about that? Certainly not many people I know. Hell, most people don't know why we count time the way we do, or how we decide what the "correct" time is (as if there were such a thing), or why Christmas is celebrated when it is (and I'm talking to my holier-than-thou Christian readers) or why we celebrate New Year's when we do, but all of that doesn't matter to the everyday, trying-to-keep-my-head-above-water workaholic that most of us have become.
Let's be honest, regardless of our alleged religious beliefs, we spend a whole lot of time just muddling through, trying to ensure we can pay the bills, and, if all goes well, have a bit or relaxation in-between. Let me let you in on a little secret: that's mere existence, it has nothing to do with living at all.
But, be that as it may ... in just a few days, the "Mad Season" will end. Of what do I speak? Allow me a little pointer toward another way to mark the days:
Way back in November, when Anglophones were pretending to care about those who died to bring us the freedom we never had, a simultaneous, mostly-unknown-outside-Germany event took place, but one much more to my liking: on the 11th day of the 11th month, at 11 minutes after the 11th hour, Karneval (as it's known in the Cologne region) or Fasching (as it's known most other places) begins. It runs from 11 November though Ash Wednesday, culminating of course on Rose Monday (the Monday before Ash Wednesday). Fasching is the season of fools, jesters, and all the critical insight that goes with them. (If you don't believe that fools are wise, read a couple of Shakespeare's tragedies, or do a bit of googling on "Till Eulenspiegel".) As for the States, it's called Mardi Gras, but unless you're from New Orleans, you probably don't know much about it anyway.
Though I'm not a big Fasching celebrator myself (it's much more popular in Catholic regions, since Ash Wednesday is a big day for Catholics, but not for Protestants), I'm glad it's still celebrated -- in all senses of the word -- here. There's a lot of silliness, and revelry, good, biting political cabaret, and music, and parades, and costumes, and the driving off of evil spirits, and things blatantly pagan masquerading within the bounds of good old Church tradition. We Americans, in particular, with our predilection to all things Puritanical and Calvinist miss out on all the fun. We like to think of ourselves a free spirits, but until you've been to Cologne on Rose Monday, you really don't know what you're talking about.
Of course, this year it will be different, but elucidating the reasons would detract from all the fun, and wouldn't most of us just prefer to have fun, regardless of what else is going on around us?
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