Recently, I saw on TikTok that a girl interrupted her proctored exam because her boyfriend posted another person on his Instagram for National Girlfriends Day. Her professor ended up giving the woman a zero, and she seemed more upset about the infidelity than failing her test.
While reading the comments, it looked like everyone was validating this person’s response, and I felt like I was in “The Twilight Zone.” I had a different reaction when watching the video, thinking “Why did you let that ruin your exam and stand in the way of your future?”
According to the National Day Calendar website, nationaldaycalendar.com, National Girlfriends Day is held on Aug. 1 and is meant for women to celebrate their friendships with one another. The original intent of the holiday has clearly been lost in translation, as it’s now viewed as a day to celebrate your girlfriend in a romantic sense. In my experience, these celebrations are a new phenomenon in the social media age.
In addition to National Girlfriends Day, there is National Boyfriends Day on Oct. 3 and National Couples Day on Aug. 18. Those are just some of the recently made-up holidays that make people who aren’t in relationships feel worse about being alone. Shouldn’t we want to celebrate our loved ones all 365 days of the year instead of just one? Isn’t Valentine’s Day enough?
Normally, I wouldn’t pay much attention to these faux holidays, but they are impossible to escape as a single 23-year-old with a smartphone addiction.
It always sneaks up on me, too. I could open Instagram on a random day and find out its National (insert romantic partner here) Day and my feed is clogged with happy pictures of people with their significant others.
Despite sometimes feeling like a slap across the face, some of these absurd national holidays provide some entertainment. It’s interesting to see the people who are posting someone new on their profile and those who aren’t. There’s a lot of juicy information that can be mined from one single social media post. As a reporter, I can’t help but be nosey. It’s my job.
There aren’t just holidays for people in relationships either. For every person, place, food and pretty much anything else you can think of, there’s a day dedicated to it. While some are completely harmless, others can be painful reminders of what’s missing from your life.
Fortunately, there are some national holidays for fellow single people. In browsing the National Calendar Day website, I learned that Unmarried and Single Americans Week is celebrated every third week in September, National Singles Day is observed on Sept. 20 and Singles Awareness Day is Feb. 15.
With that in mind, maybe I shouldn’t complain so much when single people get an entire week and couples get a few days out of the year. Despite this new information, I have never seen someone post online celebrating National Singles Day. This year, I may just lead the charge to change that trend.
Further research on the National Calendar Day website led me down a rabbit hole to even more unusual national holidays. Some of my personal favorites include National Nothing Day on Jan. 16, International Talk Like a Pirate Day on Sept. 19 and Pretend to be a Time Traveler Day on Dec. 8.
I was even surprised to learn that my birthday falls on National Yucatan Shrimp Day, National Wyoming Day, Brother’s Day, National Escargot Day and National Scavenger Hunt Day. If nothing else, I have years’ worth of party ideas in the bag now.
There are even national holidays centered around newspapers. National Columnists Day is celebrated on April 18, National Newspaper Carrier Day is on Sept. 4 and National Newspaper Week is observed during the first week of October.
Another question is how exactly does one celebrate some of the more ridiculous national holidays? For example, on National Nothing Day the National Calendar Day website says it can be observed by leaving the calendar blank or sending a blank email to colleagues. National Be Late for Something Day on Sept. 5 aims to highlight the positive aspects of procrastination. I don’t think my editor would appreciate if I missed my deadline that day because I was stopping to smell the roses.
The process of creating your very own national holiday is fairly simple. Any Tom, Dick or Harry looking to spread awareness on a particular topic can register his own national day, week or month on the National Day Calendar website. All you have to do is provide a name, phone number, address and a brief description of what your holiday is, and it will be listed online.
Although National Day Calendar claims to be the original and authoritative source on national holidays, there are actually several organizations dedicated to the same cause. Websites such as National Today and Checkiday.com all provide a database of national holidays and applications to create one yourself.
I know I might be coming across as a buzzkill, but normally, I’m a big fan of holidays. I love getting dressed up and watching my favorite scary movies on Halloween, passing out from eating too much turkey on Thanksgiving and exchanging gifts with my loved ones on Christmas.
However, the reason these holidays are special to me is because they all occur over a three-month period of the year, and I get to spend the other nine months looking forward to them. If every day on the calendar is some kind of special occasion, then doesn’t that mean none of them are?