Naturally, a day that comes around only once every four years is a day that gets people thinking about where they were in their life the last time this day came around. I've seen some great posts about it -- particularly this one from Mandy Hubbard, a must-read for writers (especially those of us on submission) -- but the funny thing is, I simply can't remember. Previous Leap Days seem to no longer be stored in my brain. I do Look-Backs a lot. I had a particularly vivid Cinqo de Mayo one year, and I remember marking the moment in my head that night and wondering where I'd be the next Cinqo de Mayo, how my life would be different; if. I have this compulsion to track progress, to say things like, "Here I am today, which is weird, because there I was at this time last week." Like this past Sunday at 7:15pm when I looked at the clock and noted to myself that it'd been exactly a week, to the minute, since I got mugged. "Remember those moments before it happened?" I thought. "Remember how different I was, just a week ago?" (The answer: not very.)

Anyway. The strange thing about today is that I can't do a Look-Back to last Leap Day. Because I don't remember marking it at all. In fact, I have no memories of any earlier Leap Days whatsoever.

So, to rectify that:

I wore a new dress today, thinking I'd be at a luncheon that I ended up skipping. It's gray and smooth.
I smiled a goodbye to my sleeping boyfriend this morning, who looked so intensely comfortable it made me hiccup.
It's raining, and already feels like spring, and the corner bodega was selling small cartons of tulips in pastel foil wrappings, and it made me think of my mother.
Tonight I have a girls' dinner with my favorites, and we'll huddle under a roof and toast ourselves.

There. Now I can remember this Leap Day for when the next one comes in 2016.