Edna Halsey is both the oldest and the youngest resident at the Elms Retirement Village.
She was born a leap year baby, meaning she has a birthday of February 29, 2016, but only has an official calendar birthday once every 4 years! “I can be 25 or 100,” Halsey said.
This leap year, Edna gets to celebrate her 100th birthday, saying the key to her longevity is laughter.
“Smile and the world smiles with you. Cry and you cry alone. That’s what I do and that’s exactly how I live,” says Halsey.
There are some downsides to being a leap year baby, Halsey said. The date on her driver’s license never matched her birth certificate, but that never stopped her from driving.
Halsey’s daughter, Janet Cromley, 66, says, “I feel very blessed because there aren’t many people that can say their mother has been around as long as mine has,” she said. “And there aren’t many who can also say she’s really only 25.”
And along with Halsey are many other leap year babies- about 200,000 in the United States and just under 5 million worldwide.
The odds of being a leap year baby are said to be 684 in 1 million!
Some leap babies opt to celebrate their birthdays on February 28th, and others insist March 1 is more correct because they were born the day following February 28th.
But, leap babies do experience some problems with not being able to select their birthdays from a drop-down menu online, or those several years when Facebook didn’t acknowledge that birthday.
Despite the occasional headache, leap babies derive a certain pride from their unique status, and many says it makes them feel special and makes those rare “real” birthdays even more worthy of celebrating.
Happy Birthday to all the leap year babies!
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[Featured Image Credit: Anna Norris- Chronicle]
‘I Can Be 25 or 100’: Leap Year Baby Celebrates Her Birthday is an article from: LifeDaily