Okay, I confess I’m a tad (ha!) superstitious. Step on a crack you’ll break your mother’s back. Break a mirror and you’ll have seven years of bad luck. Don’t walk under a ladder. Find a penny pick it up all day long you’ll have good luck. Since it’s Friday the thirteenth I though it was a good day to ask the Wickeds if they had any superstitions.
I also saw these interesting superstitions from around the world:
A German superstition declares that if you cheers with water you’re actually wishing death upon the people you’re drinking with. The idea stems from Greek mythology.
In Turkey, an itchy right hand means you’ll come into some money but an itch on your left means you’ll lose money.
This one seems unlucky all around but just go with it. Stepping in dog poop is actually considered good luck in France if you do it with your left foot. It’s only bad luck if you step with your right foot.
Jessie: What a fun question, Sherry! It sounds morbid but I never will speak about automobile accidents when I’m in a car. It just feels like asking for trouble somehow!
Edith/Maddie: Interesting, Jessie. I STILL avoid lines (Step on a line, you’ll break your mother’s spine) and cracks and my mom has been gone for eight years. I also always pick up that penny and I avoid walking under ladders. In Brazil, 13 is considered good luck! Do any of you throw salt over your left shoulder when you spill some?
Barb: I’m not superstitious AT ALL, but I regularly knock on wood, so…
Sherry: Barb, my daughter says: knock on air, it’s always there. I’m very suspicious of the number 13. I don’t want to get out of bed if the hour is whatever followed by 13. I’ll wait for one more minute. Weird, huh?
Julie: Edith, I’m a salt tosser! I never wish people good luck, I tell them to break a leg. That’s a theater superstition, one of many, that has moved into the rest of my life. The challenge is that telling a non-theater person to break a leg isn’t always met with gratitude.
Readers: Do you have any superstitions?
I also have the theatre superstition of saying either “break a leg” or “merde”. And, of course, I never actually say the name of “the Scottish Play” … which can be kind of tough when you’re actually in a production of the play (which I was during my college years). Fortunately, in my tiny part, I never had to directly address the title character or actually say his name. (I did, however, get some good recipes out of the weird sisters. Does anybody happen to have any eye of newt handy?)
Laughing! I did theater in high school and got use to saying break a leg too.
I used to be a coach. OF COURSE I’M SUPERSTITIOUS!
When I coached a team of 3rd-5th grade girls, half the team had never even played the game before. So as we started off undefeated, I wouldn’t even let them think upon the next game. We’d play a game and then I’d make them start thinking about the next PRACTICE!
Then when a parent or two started mentioning that we were undefeated six games into the season, I had to get them to not talk about it. I mean, Don’t Ruin It, Willya?
But it worked. We went undefeated for the whole year and the team of girls with most having never played before won the title.
I wore the logo shirt for the movie Serenity for each game when we had a 21 game win streak.
And I always made the kids aware that they shouldn’t “talk smack before a game, because if you don’t back it up during a game, you look like an idiot after the game”.
At the start of every season, I’d pick 5 songs to listen to before I left the house each gameday and then I would listen to those five songs each week for the whole season.
And I avoid cracks in the road when walking too.
You made me laugh too! What an amazing season!
I too knock on wood,toss salt over the shoulder and try not to step on cracks. I don’t fear black cats. I like them. My grandmother taught me to never put shoes on the table. Why? It meant there’d be a hanging in the family!
Wow! I’ve never heard the shoes on the table one! Very interesting!
My grandmother wouldn’t let me put shoes on the table, either, but it was because she didn’t want my dirty shoes on her clean table!
Iām sure thatās why the superstition was āinventedā. Scared the crap out of the kids to behave.
Very interesting!
On the pick up a penny superstition, always heard that if you find it heads up and pass it on then both of you have great good fortune in the future. Definitely toss the salt over the shoulder – especially if the salt is spilled while cooking or the meal will be a disaster. š Think the not stepping on a crack one is a way to remember our Mom (even those in heaven like mine) as well as brings back a smile and a glimmer of our childhood.
2clowns at arkansas dot net
Hmmmm, it seems like most of my meals are disasters — maybe I need to start tossing salt.
SNORT, Sherry!
Iām really not superstitious, but I do carry a coin I found many years ago that is square and from CuraƧao. Donāt know why, I just like it. Sure I pick up pennies (and any other coins). Itās money.š¤Ŗ And I love black cats (weāve had several), and Iāve always loved Friday the 13th.
I do like to read about the origins of superstitions. Some are fascinating and explain the phenomena logically.
Ya can’t beat free money, right?
Lovely Kathryn Windham did a whole set on Southern superstitions at Jonesborough one year. One was to eat pie from the crust end, not the point . .. perhaps thought up by a good who hated to see her good crust leftover.
She mentioned throwing salt to ward off evil, but also when passing salt, not to pass it hand to hand but rather to place it on the table to be picked up by the other person “or you’ll give them all your luck.” My nephews told that as a challenge, to snatch the salt before it could be set down. š My dad told us we could knock on our heads if there was no wood handy “they’re hard enough.” š
I have abandoned “break a let” and “to die for” after a friend advised me to read YOUR BODY BELIEVES EVERY WORD YOU SAY. Those messages can bring their own danger. In tricky situations, I try to only think positives.
I hadn’t heard the salt passing one! Thinking in positives is a good thing!
Iām not actively superstitious, but I will knock on wood (usually just my skull). Not walking under ladders is just good sense.
Thatās interesting about toasting people with water. Since water is what I normally drink, thatās what I usually toast people with. Good thing Iām not in Germany.
Iām a bit nervous about today being Friday the 13th. With what happened yesterday, Iām hoping today isnāt worse. (For context, I work at Princess Cruises and was at Left Coast Crime when it was cancelled last night.)
Uh-oh!
I hope they have plenty of work to keep you busy — it’s scary out there.
Work is going to be insanely busy at least over the next few weeks. And now they are going to have us work from home, so how we are going to figure out how to account properly for everything without being able to talk to each other as easily is going to be a big challenge.
An animal shelter here names their black kittens Jelly Bean to make them more adoptable.
That is sweet! It’s so sad that black cats get a bad rap.
I donāt really think of myself as superstitious, but I guess I am ā I knock on wood, watch out for cracks soI donāt step on them, and throw salt over my shoulder. Black cats donāt bother me…I think they are so pretty.
I agree about black cats!