Happy birthday: ‘It’s Gonna Be May’ meme turns 10

The calendar flipped to a new month on Sunday. That means it’s gonna be May -- for the 10th straight year.

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The iconic “It’s gonna be May” meme, which plays off Justin Timberlake’s pronunciation of “me” in the *NSYNC song “It’s Gonna Be Me,” is a decade old and counting, CNN reported.

Throughout the track, which was released in 2000, Timberlake, who was part of the boy band, pronounces “me” like “may.”

The meme was created by Kianna Davis when she was a student at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia. The university was founded in 1908 and took its present name 30 years later to honor Mary Ball Washington, the mother of George Washington, the first U.S. president.

According to a news release by the university, Davis, a junior at the time, was in her second-floor dormitory room at Westmoreland Hall when she came up with the idea.

“I had been planning my busy April calendar and posted it as a joke to my friends,” Davis, who majored in business at the university and helped plan concerts at the school, told the university.

Davis, who now works for an education software company, said she had been a fan of *NSYNC since 1998, when the band débuted on the Disney Channel concert series.

“I watched it over and over. I never got to see them in concert, but I begged my mother for any memorabilia she saw in stores,” Davis told the university. “I still have an *NSYNC blanket she gave me for Christmas 20 years ago.

The meme remains a staple on the internet at the end of April, CNN reported.

Last year, Timberlake gave a shout-out to Davis on social media, posting her photo to his Instagram story, People reported. Timberlake wrote, “Now that it’s ACTUALLY May, I have to give props where they are due. Look what you started.”

Timberlake put a laughing emoji next to Davis’ photo.

“I was in shock,” Davis told the university. “I got so many calls and texts, I had to keep my phone on the charger all day.”

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