Superstitions

[SweetErika]

Following another Friday the 13th, I got to wondering about the superstitions of the folks here.

Do you believe certain things bring good or bad luck? If so, what are your superstitions? How did they come about, and what do you do about them?

Regardless of what you believe now, did you have any superstitions as a child? It seems like most kids I know at least a few, even if they're just along the lines of stepping over cracks to avoid breaking their mothers' backs.

Do you have any interesting stories or tidbits regarding superstitions?

<ed>My answers later, yadda, yadda, yadda...</ed>

 

[Mz_Cunningham]

I don't know if it's really a superstition, but I didn't used to like swimming in pools because I thought sharks were in them

Although I don't believe it, I also like to avoid walking on cracks on the floor, mainly because I think it looks funny

 

[jayce1066]

One of my closely held superstitions is that if you hand someone a pocketknife with the blade open, it's bad luck for them to close the blade before they give it back to you.
That was a folk-belief where I grew up.

 

[SweetErika]

I don't know if it's really a superstition, but I didn't used to like swimming in pools because I thought sharks were in them

When I was 8, we took a family vacation to the Yellowstone area, and I got a severe case of Strep Throat. My fever was so high that I was convinced there were sharks in the swimming pool and really started freaking out. My parents knew I was seriously sick because I LOVED swimming everywhere, so they hauled me off to the Tribal Health Clinic the next day.

Anyway, once in a great while, I still get a little panicked about swimming in deep water. That one experience as a child put a fear in the very back of my mind, and it still resurfaces for some reason.

One of my closely held superstitions is that if you hand someone a pocketknife with the blade open, it's bad luck for them to close the blade before they give it back to you.
That was a folk-belief where I grew up.

Interesting; I've never heard that one. Do you know where it comes from, or what the reasoning behind it is?

 

[jayce1066]

I grew up in SW Arkansas. The pocketknife business was taken as absolute fact. I don't recall ever hearing any possible reason for it.
We also believed that eating fish and drinking milk in the same meal would result in a quick and painful death.

 

[wicked woman]

Not particularly superstitious. I like Friday the 13th.


One of my aunts was supersitious about who poured the tea in her house. She believed that if she let anyone but her pour the tea, that someone would get pregnant. She couldn't remember if it would be her or the person that poured the tea, but she wasn't taking any chances.

 

[NippleMuncher]

I don't like to call them superstitions, I prefer just good common sense ...

The mind is a funny thing, think about something that scares you and you'll instantly become scared and blow whatever your fear is out of proportion to the actual event. Spiders, for instance. The little creepy crawlies we've got here in the states are pretty harmless, particularly when adorning the bottom of your shoe, yet folks tend to go ballistic when they see one. It's not like it's a tarantula (still a harmless spider, but scary because of it's size ) or even worse a camel spider!

I personally don't have any superstitions that I can think of, but they do cross my mind when say breaking a mirror or working around a ladder.

 

[SweetErika]

We also believed that eating fish and drinking milk in the same meal would result in a quick and painful death.

I've never heard that one either, but after doing a bit of research, it appears to be common in the South and many other cultures around the world. One person I came across theorized it came about when there was no refrigeration or pasteurization; because both fresh fish and milk spoil particularly quickly in the heat, consuming both together could be particularly dangerous if they were both spoiled.

There's a similar myth about combining cherries and milk, which seems to have started after one of our presidents died from food poisoning after eating the two together.

Not particularly superstitious. I like Friday the 13th.


One of my aunts was supersitious about who poured the tea in her house. She believed that if she let anyone but her pour the tea, that someone would get pregnant. She couldn't remember if it would be her or the person that poured the tea, but she wasn't taking any chances.

I don't like Friday the 13th only because I got in a car accident on one in May of 2005. Ever since, I've taken care to not drive, or do a lot of driving, on those days. I know it's irrational, but something in my head is convinced that I need to be extra, extra careful that day. It's probably my only real superstition.

Your aunt's theory is hilarious! I wonder how that one came about.

 

[LettersFromTatyana]

Yup. My grandmother used to tell me it was bad luck to have baby showers before the baby is born, and bad luck to cut a baby's hair before their first birthday.

I tried--really tried!--to get out of a baby shower. I failed in month eight, and I was nervous as hell throughout the last month of my pregnancy that I'd jinxed myself. Thankfully, I didn't.

The kid is still under a year old, and the hair just keeps growing! Everyone keeps asking when we will cut it (of course the kid came with massive amounts of hair), and I have to be really evasive with the answers. How can I tell them the truth? It's just so... ridiculous.

 

[SweetErika]

Yup. My grandmother used to tell me it was bad luck to have baby showers before the baby is born, and bad luck to cut a baby's hair before their first birthday.

I tried--really tried!--to get out of a baby shower. I failed in month eight, and I was nervous as hell throughout the last month of my pregnancy that I'd jinxed myself. Thankfully, I didn't.

The kid is still under a year old, and the hair just keeps growing! Everyone keeps asking when we will cut it (of course the kid came with massive amounts of hair), and I have to be really evasive with the answers. How can I tell them the truth? It's just so... ridiculous.

I haven't heard either of those, either. The shower one makes sense to me; I don't think it brings bad luck or anything to have one pre-baby, but I can see (especially in the times and places where more babies died right before or after birth) how awful it'd be to have a big celebration, then have something go wrong. I didn't have my shower until our son was a month old, and quite frankly, I liked it that way because we knew what we really needed and everyone got to see the baby.

As for the haircut, we did it before his birthday so he'd look good in the pictures. He was great for the trim, and is just fine now, of course. Maybe a good compromise is to get a "trim" and relocate the hair to an envelope?

 

[softkitty]

Superstitious

My mother was always superstitious about leaving by the same door when she visited a house. It was funny if we went for something like a BBQ because she would have to walk thru the house to leave by the same door, even if we all ended up outside during the day. She past away several years ago but I still try to do it from time to time as a kind of hello to her.

 

[glynndah]

I come from a family of very superstitious people. My mother will not pass salt from hand to hand for fear of very dire consequences. It must be placed on the table and then picked up by the person requesting the salt. My grandmother insisted that if you get water on you when washing dishes, especially on your "belly", you would marry a drunk.

On the other hand, having a black cat cross your path was considered very good luck. It was the white ones you needed to watch out for.

 

[SweetErika]

I have a couple more, courtesy of my husband's Chinese coworkers:

- Apparently it was very good luck for our first baby to be a boy. I think it's good luck to have any healthy baby, but if a boy is extra good, I'll take it.

- When the coworkers came to visit us shortly after the birth, they totally freaked out when when we stroked our son's head. Touching a baby's head (especially the forehead) is not only bad luck, it causes some sort of brain damage! One of the ladies believed this so much that she made a hasty exit from the hospital after we touched our newborn's head!

 

[Eilan]

Yup. My grandmother used to tell me it was bad luck to have baby showers before the baby is born, and bad luck to cut a baby's hair before their first birthday.

I always heard that it's bad luck to have a crib before the baby is born.

 

[jayce1066]

Veering slightly into mythical beasts, I recall Grandma telling me about the hoop snake and the joint snake. She may have been greening me, but I was certainly convinced such things existed for a few years.

 

[IrisAlthea]

Putting shoes on the bed or keys on the the table is supposed to bad luck, I think.

 

[Cattypuss]

I come from a very susperstitious family and I reacted against it as a very young age (like 6 or 7) by refusing to believe in ANY superstitions.

Things that my mum and her mum believed -

• You have to turn over every coin in your purse every time there is a full moon
• You must never, ever put new shoes on a table
• You must never, ever, pass someone going the other way on a staircase in a house
• If you see a lone magpie, you must say (and do) the following: "Hold your collar, never swallow, til you see a dog"
• Plus all the usual ones (13s, spilled salt, ladders, black cats, open umbrellas indoors etc)

 

[wicked woman]

Yup. My grandmother used to tell me it was bad luck to have baby showers before the baby is born, and bad luck to cut a baby's hair before their first birthday. I tried--really tried!--to get out of a baby shower. I failed in month eight, and I was nervous as hell throughout the last month of my pregnancy that I'd jinxed myself. Thankfully, I didn't.

The kid is still under a year old, and the hair just keeps growing! Everyone keeps asking when we will cut it (of course the kid came with massive amounts of hair), and I have to be really evasive with the answers. How can I tell them the truth? It's just so... ridiculous.

Yup this was very popularwhere I live until maybe the last few decades. I don't know that it was considered bad luck, more that so many things could go wrong that it was better to make sure that you had a baby, before you had a baby shower. There was the practical side to it also. Back then you had to wait until you actually had a baby before you knew if it would be a boy or girl.

I still find it strange when people have the baby shower before they actually have a baby.

 

[SweetErika]

[*]If you see a lone magpie, you must say (and do) the following: "Hold your collar, never swallow, til you see a dog"
]

What happens if you need to swallow before you see a dog? Are you supposed to spit? And what if you don't see a dog for so long that you collapse from hypoglycemia or die of dehydration?

 

[Cattypuss]

What happens if you need to swallow before you see a dog? Are you supposed to spit? And what if you don't see a dog for so long that you collapse from hypoglycemia or die of dehydration?

Yes, you're supposed to spit... and wherever you see magpies (i.e. green spaces, usually), you are going to see a dog pretty soon (nation of dog-lovers and, more to the point, dog-walkers here)

 

[DarkBee]

How do crazy, unproven tics like that come to be? I'm curious.

 

[jayce1066]

If you had money in your pocket on New Year's Day, you'd have money all year long.

 

[newlegz]

My superstitions are more personal than cultural like some of the others. I just do certain things the same way every time. Same bathroom stall every time, or lucky clothes. Chapstick and kleenex on the desk for every test. A cross that I rub for good luck.

 

[culloden]

I don't walk under ladders, but that's just 'cause it's freakin' dangerous. Otherwise, not superstitious.

 

[fire_breeze]

How do crazy, unproven tics like that come to be? I'm curious.

[\cultural history lesson]

Finding the origin of a particular superstition is iffy at best, because there is no one way. Some were ways to control one's fate; others are grounded in quasi-purpose. For example, breaking a mirror will bring 7 years of bad luck is based on the fact that mirrors were very very *very* expensive. If a servant broke one, it took an average of 7 years of his/her full pay to pay it off. So they'd say to a new servant not to break a mirror because 7 years of bad luck will ensure (as s/he was essentially a slave for that time).

Work related superstitions are often grounded in practicality. Whistling backstage in theatre is considered bad luck because the early stagehands were former sailors who communicated with a series of whistles. If some punk started whistling "Mary had a lamb", he might get a sandbag on his head as it might be a signal to release something.

Saying "bless you" on the other hand stems from the fact that it was believed that a sneeze expelled the evil/bad spirit of the body (not a bad comparison as often a sneeze is used to dislodge an irritant in the nose), so it a cause for celebration. Fast forward to the 14th Century and the time of the Plague. If a person began to sneeze violently, s/he was going to die, so it became tradition to 'bless' the person in order to ease his/her transition into death. Or storks nesting in your chimney is good luck: well, storks roost where there is calm and warmth, so they'll build a nest in which the house is a)cozy and b) quiet. No fighting and continuous burning embers meant a prosperous household, so in turn it became a sign of good luck to come.

Some superstitions have roots in the old religions. As a religion/world view becomes replaced with another (and I'd like to add, not necessarily by Christianity. Non Christian religions replaced others with regular frequency) one way to 'preserve' unique culture was to practice it as superstition. Also, the new peoples in power would label an unknown practice as superstition.

Superstitions about names are the most common place. To know a name means to have power over the object, a thought that is prevalent in many modern societies. Why do you think we still have nicknames?

However, in the end, it's rarely, if ever clear.

[/cultural history lesson]

To answer SweetE's question: I am probably the world's most rational person, but I have some strange superstitions. I keep most of the theatre superstitions, such as making sure there's a ghost light on, no whistling, etc. I will not say the M-word, as I've always had bad luck with it, so that taught me to be extra wary. Sad, but it's true.

Most of the other superstition, I do out of habit/tradition, not because I believe it gives me bad luck. If I'm holding a baby, I will not say its name, I won't sit at the corners of a table, I will not give a purse/wallet without a coin, I will not give a knife as a present (either pay me or I pay you), I won't give just money, etc. I know the rationale behind each superstition, analysed it and still chose to practice it, because for me it's part of my traditional heritage as opposed to believing something will bring me luck.