T.S. Eliot’s famous poem, The Waste Land, opens: “April is the cruelest month”, a statement to which many people agree. I do not. While April does have its fair share of rain, so does the rest of the year (in Georgia, at least). No, the cruelest month, in my opinion, is not April, but February.
Not only is February cold, dreary, and obscenely short, but it is somehow also home to two of the most asinine ‘holidays’ of the year. On the second of the month, we look to an oversized squirrel to find out when we’ll finally be able to ditch our boots in favor of flip-flops. And on the fourteenth, we drain our bank accounts on bouquets and candy and gifts– either for ‘that someone special’ (if we’re lucky), or on ourselves, as we wallow in self-pity watching Netflix rom-coms. Both occurring before the month is even half over. Seriously?
Why some still enjoy the superstition of Groundhog Day despite modern science having proven its fallacy is beyond me. There is absolutely no correlation between Punxsutawney Phil’s shadow and the yearly transition between winter and spring. And yet nearly forty thousand people go to see the ‘spectacle’ each year, not to mention all those tuning in via their extensive livestream and news coverage. And not only has the science proven to be completely bogus, but the history is also incredibly inconsistent. Multiple mid-1800s records point to different places as the exact location of this pointless holiday’s unknown beginnings. Nobody knows where it started, and yet, everyone wants to lay claim to it because of a quality 1993 comedy flick.
And Valentine’s Day. Don’t even get me started. The history is pretty dodgy, but it boils down to the fact that many Christian figures happened to have the name Valentine, and several of those men ended up martyrs. The holiday was far from romantic until the 1700s– until then, it was a religious holiday. Only then did courtship rituals cause it to flourish. (Fun fact, they used to give children Valentine’s candy and cards in order to ward off epilepsy. Good times!). And somehow between then and now, corporations took a rather sweet sentiment and ruined it by jacking up the price of chocolates, roses, and cards, swapping mistletoe for hearts each January.
So, no. April is not the cruelest month. That is a title I must reserve for February. Between the occasional ‘extra day’, two nonsensical holidays, and bitter cold, I can safely rank it among my least favorite months (August is up there too, but we’ll save that for another day).