Much-maligned month deserves much better

Once again I rise in defense of January.

I am tired of all the whining about how god-awful long the month is and that there’s nothing to do or that nothing ever happens in January. This poor month is so maligned that I have once before felt compelled to defend it. But the carping continues, so clearly I haven’t convinced the skeptics out there and am motivated to make an effort again.

Oh sure, January lacks the oodles of daylight that July provides. And besides the overcast skies, it’s cold and snowy and is pretty much the morning-after letdown after the whole celebratory blur that is the Thanksgiving-Christmas- Hanukkah-New Year’s marathon.

I’ll give you the first couple of days of the month to take down the decorations, come off the sugar high and maybe sober up a little. But then, please, be on board with how cool January is. It’s got such a pretty name for starters – for the Roman god Janus, the god of doors (because the month is the door to the New Year).

Most significantly, as just stated, it begins a new year. It is the fresh new start we all normally embrace (except, apparently, when it comes with snow). New possibilities. Clean slate. Hope. Optimism. These are perfectly delightful things.

And consider this – January is a month in which nothing particular is expected of you. It’s kind of a recovery month. Soon Valentine’s Day will be upon us, and we’re once again off to the races for the year’s festival of holidays and demands. So enjoy this respite.

A whole bunch of fascinating, historic and pivotal things have happened in January. We’ve just celebrated the birth of Martin Luther King Jr. Going back to 1967, the very first Super Bowl took place on Jan. 15, but February has now stolen this celebration from its rightful month.

But never mind the whole month, let’s take a look at just today – Jan. 22. On this day in 1901, Queen Victoria died after a 63-year reign on the British throne; and the famous romantic poet Lord Byron was born in 1788. The Bloody Sunday massacre that started the first Russian Revolution took place in 1905, and Unabomber Ted Kaczynski pleaded guilty in 1998 in California to his 17-year campaign of package bombings. These are not inconsequential things.

This date in 1973 saw several other important milestones: Former President Lyndon Johnson died in Texas and a young heavyweight named George Foreman stunned the boxing world with a TKO victory over reigning champion Joe Frazier in the world championship bout in Jamaica. And perhaps most significant of all, like it or not, on Jan. 22 in 1973, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Roe vs. Wade case that a woman has the right to terminate her pregnancy.

Looking forward a day to Jan. 23, in 1922 a 14-year-old boy in Toronto became the first person to receive an insulin injection to treat diabetes, and on a lighter note, in 1957 the Wham-o toy company produced its first aerodynamic disc – an item that became known worldwide as the Frisbee.

There are, of course, a number of lesser and not-so-official observations during the month. Some are real head-scratchers but are fun to try to reason out. We just missed Squirrel Appreciation Day, which was Wednesday, when we were encouraged to appreciate our tree-climbing furry-tailed friends. The day was created in 2001 by a wildlife rehabilitator in North Carolina.

Jan. 3 was Fruitcake Toss Day, the timing of which needs no explanation, and Jan. 10 was Houseplant Appreciation Day, created by the Gardner’s Network to remind people that their neglected houseplants can use a little attention after the holidays.

Tomorrow is National Handwriting Day to “alert the public to the importance of handwriting,” according to the Writing Instrument Manufacturers Association (no self-interest here), the organization which established the observance in 1977. Interesting to note, Jan. 23 was selected because it is the birthday of John Hancock, the first signer of the Declaration of Independence, whose large script dominates the signatory section of that document.

And if you can hold off your celebratory enthusiasm until Saturday – Jan. 24 is Beer Can Appreciation Day, no doubt because on that date in 1935 the first canned beer went on sale when the Gottfried Krueger Brewing Co. delivered 2,000 cans of beer to the thirsty in Richmond, Virginia – just in time for the Super Bowl season, if the Super Bowl had existed then.

And if you are interested in oddities, on Jan. 25, 1905, at a mine in Pretoria, South Africa, a 3,106-carat diamond was discovered (weighing 1.33 pounds), the largest diamond ever found. It was cut into nine large stones and 100 small ones. The largest two, the Star of Africa I and II, are considered the largest-cut fine-quality colorless diamonds in the world; both reside in the Tower of London along with Britain’s other crown jewels.

I’m sorry, all you nay-sayers out there, January is just a darn interesting month.