Stuck on Luck

STUCK on LUCK

“See a Penny pick it up – all that day you’ll have good luck.” No doubt we’ve all heard that catchy little saying and no doubt some of us have picked up a penny hoping for good luck to follow.  

Of course, nowadays in Canada, you would have to be extremely lucky to find a penny to pick up because pennies are no longer in circulation.  Perhaps it’s time to change the denomination to “a nickel”?

You may wonder why I’m even thinking about this subject.  Well, like all of the memories that invade my consciousness it begins quite innocently with a chance remark.

Recently, I learned that LS would be travelling by air on Friday the 13^th.  We both laughed and agreed that for our family the 13^th was believed to be a very lucky number!  And of course, belief is the operative word in any discussion about superstitions.

Our belief that the number 13 was lucky, is very strange when you consider that our mother came from a long line of super-superstitious Irish Catholics.  We were brought up in a household where almost everything was imbued with either good or bad luck. So, how come the 13^th got a pass?  Nothing else did. 

As a modern woman I consider these beliefs to be suitable for entertaining conversation but unable to stand the light of scientific inspection.  Nevertheless, ALL of these beliefs were very important to my mother's life, and by extension our little Covey that lived under their spell. So I think they deserve the time I've spent with Mr. Google researching the whats and whys.

Being told: "Don't walk under that ladder!"  seems to me more like good advice rather than superstition.  And the same goes for not opening umbrellas inside the house.  After all, you're very unlucky if you get poked with one of those spikey parts.  Seems there was always a little bit of common sense attached to these decrees.  If you Break a mirror - get seven years of bad luck.  Broken bits of mirror equal more sharp objects and it's always bad luck if you cut yourself.  But seven years!  However, if you broke a mirror in our house you'd probably get seven years of being reminded of the fact that you broke it.  There was other stuff to do with mirrors, including covering them up if someone died.  Of course you could always ward off bad luck by doing the following:
Knock on wood

I understand this works by calling on the “good spirits” who live in trees. Don’t ask me how it works when I say this as I knock on my own head!

To Make a wish on a wishbone

you first need to get the wishbone of a chicken, catch one end of it with your little finger and tell somebody else to catch the other end and whoever gets the larger side after pulling it apart may wish for whatever they like.”

This no doubt sounds to you like a very innocent harmless superstition. Perhaps it could have been if there were fewer participants and many more chickens. That did not occur very often in our house.  Unless we were eating LS’s pet we were fortunate if we had chicken once a year. Work it out.  There were four children all of whom desperately wanted a wish fulfilled!

Cross your fingers. I still do this. Cross one finger over another and wish for luck. Apparently, it’s a gesture that's said to date back to early Christianity. (Anything associated with the shape of the Christian cross was thought to be good luck.) These days, just saying "fingers crossed" is enough to get the message, well, across.

We learned that it was very unlucky to Spill the salt. I did not have much handling of the salt but I do recall watching my mother spill salt then take a pinch to throw over her left shoulder.

Apparently, this counteracted all the bad stuff by throwing the salt into the eyes of the devil.  Of course, it was wise not to stand behind her when she was cooking in case you stood in for the devil.

Growing up, Shoes on the table was a definite No! No! 

It kind of has a nice hygienic ring to it, doesn’t it? And one that has a personal memory for me.  As a grown woman with many, many years of self sufficiency under my belt, secure in the knowledge that all these stupid superstitions meant nothing to me, it came as quite a surprise when I found myself seated next to a complete stranger at a local dance.  She had insisted in placing her dance shoes on the table, and I, I like to think uncharacteristically, lost it!

If ever we had the sensation of Burning ears we knew somebody, somewhere, was talking about us.  I'm not sure but I think it wasn't good stuff they were saying, so burning ears was not as good as itchy palms.  Of course, the good or bad luck of this phenomena was dependent on which palm was itching,  Either way it had to do with money.  One hand meant you had money coming to you while the other hand meant you had to pay it out.  I could never remember which was which so I'd try to decide whether I normally paid out money with my right hand and received money with my left, or whether I used my right hand for both transactions.  I didn't really matter because there was a whole rigmarole of rubbing the itchy hand on various body parts whilst reciting a somewhat risque rhyme to ensure that the money was received.

Other beliefs

There were many smaller and less invasive superstitions that guided our everyday lives such as the unfortunate occurrence of putting on an item of clothing inside out, it had to be left that way because it was unlucky to change it.  Mum never wore green – must have been something to do with shamrocks!  One other of her little commands was never to allow playing cards in the house.  

This last must have caused all kinds of problems behind the scenes because Dad was a fabulous card player.  He loved cribbage and he taught everyone one of us how to play Whist.  If you really wanted to play cards then you’d better have kept them hidden, because if Mum found them, they were gone!

Knives

It is very understandable that there are so many superstitions that involve knives. Knives are sharp.  Knives are dangerous.  Knives can kill. So, attached to many of these beliefs is an element of practicality.

Knives could never be crossed for that foretold a row or argument was in the offing. However, if you straightened them immediately you might be able to prevent it.

Giving a gift of a knife was a sure-fire way of severing a relationship. This could be prevented by the recipient making a small token payment.  Apparently, this superstition actually dates back to the Vikings who believe that gifting a knife to someone implies that the receiver isn’t able to buy himself a good enough knife to kill the giver so he has to be given the knife for free. Thus, to avoid the intended insult, Vikings would “sell” a knife to a friend extremely cheap – the cost of one copper coin.

Never stir anything using your knife especially not your tea, because that would bring bad luck. Remember the rhyme: stir with a knife and stir up strife.

But the one prevalent belief that stayed with her until the very end involved never ever, ever picking up a knife she had dropped.  It stayed where it landed until someone came in who could be asked to picked it up for her.

This must have been very powerful supernatural stuff because whenever any one of us made a visit from Canada we always knew to pick up the knives that were scattered around her kitchen floor.

That’s quite a list of superstitions that controlled our everyday lives and when you know that according to the Stress Management Center and Phobia Institute in North Carolina, about 17 million people fear Friday the 13^th.  and the number 13 has a long history of being considered unlucky, it’s very difficult to understand that in our house the number 13 was believed to be lucky.  We can only guess why.

This is my guess:  Mum’s superstitious beliefs were a force apart, but I’m sure she also believed that “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em”. That’s what happened with the number thirteen.  After the war, the government put in a tremendous but very slow effort to find accommodation for all the people who were short of, or inadequately housed.  Finally, our turn came.   We became the proud residents of a three-bedroom apartment with the number 13 starkly displayed on the front door!  What could she do?  From then on Mum decided that number 13 was a very lucky number.  After all we had been very lucky to get the apartment!