In the 16th century, Pope Gregory XIII made the Gregorian calendar the default calendar of the Catholic Western world, which was eventually accepted by virtually every country in the world. The calendar has a leap year day designated in February, every four years, though we find that every 100 years we skip a leap year unless that year is divisible by 400. The thing about the calendar, though, that is perplexing, is the fact that every month of the year is either 30 or 31 days, but for some reason, February is just 28 days. Logically, it would make more sense if every month were either 30 or 31 days, and thus the calendar would consist of seven months at 30 days, and five months at 31 days if this were the case.
The thing about the calendar is that the lunar cycle lasts about 29.5 days, so there was a desire for a calendar month to be about 29 or 30 days long. However, since the time for the earth to revolve around the sun is about 365.25 days, it meant that a calendar couldn’t be produced which fairly took into account both the lunar as well as the solar schedule to thereby present a consistent yearly calendar in tune with both the lunar as well as the solar, because twelve months at an average of 29.5 days, does not contain enough days to make for a complete year, which if this was the format, would make for the agricultural seasons of the year, not being consistent from one year to the next for they would get progressively further out of sync. Hence, this meant that a compromise had to be reached, but it doesn’t seem reasonable that to reach that compromise, necessitated February having just 28 days.
That is to say, it is perplexing why February is just 28 days, and the fact that this has become industry standard throughout the world would seem to signify that this isn’t going to change anytime soon, which is unfortunate, because if months were limited to 30 or 31 days this would align better with our obligations when it came to bills as well as our paychecks, because those that pay rent in February have essentially been shortchanged, whereas those that are paid on a monthly salary basis are being paid more for having labored less in the month of February.
Indeed, it has to be admitted that just because this has been the way that it has been for centuries, it doesn’t mean that it needs to continue to be that way, so that those who contemplate our calendars and how we measure time, should have their say, of which, the very first thing to look at should be the month of February, because those so creating the most efficient calendar, true to our solar cycle and secondarily in harmony with the lunar cycle, would in all probability, not keep February at 28 days, which is something to consider, as humankind continues to evolve