Groundhog Day

February 1, 2007

Just now getting back from the daily bonfire where, in an effort to please the snow gods, we burned old ski boots, old skis, old bamboo poles and a couple of season passes to June Lake Ski Area. Someone also tossed in the severed head of a ... um, never mind.

The subject of Groundhog Day came up, naturally, on account of it's tomorrow and is the halfway point between the winter solstice and the vernal equinox. It's the weirdest holiday in any ski town. Who would actually *want* the winter to end? Around here, it hasn't even begun yet, hardly.

Thus the daily bonfire.

About Groundhog Day, though. Don't just dismiss it as a throwaway observance. Wikipedia doesn't, after all.

Groundhog Day goes back to around the fifth century.

The Celts believed that animals had certain supernatural powers on special days that were half-way between the winter solstice and vernal equinox. Folklore from Germany and France indicated that when marmots and bears came out of their winter dens too early, they were frightened by their shadows and retreated back inside for four to six weeks.

This was adopted by the Romans, who adopted just about everything, come to think of it, as Hedgehog Day.

In western countries in the Northern Hemisphere the official first day of spring is more less, kinda sorta, about six weeks after Groundhog Day, on March 20 or 21.

But before the adoption of the Gregorian calendar when the date of the equinox drifted in the Julian calendar, the spring equinox fell on March 16 instead.

This was exactly six weeks after February 2. Assuming that the equinox marked the first day of spring in certain medieval cultures, as it does now in western countries, Groundhog Day occurred exactly six weeks before spring.

Therefore, if the groundhog saw his shadow on Groundhog Day there would be six more weeks of winter. If he didn't, there would be 42 more days of winter. In other words, the Groundhog Day tradition may have begun as a bit of folk humor.

Ha ha ha.

Well, all that's for what it's worth. Take it or leave it.

Or burn it.

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