"Superstitions...With a Smile"

 Hard to believe, but tomorrow brings Daylight Savings, which means we lose an hour of sleep as clocks spring ahead. As a morning person, and as one who likes his sleep, this is a practice I do not like.

 

I hope you enjoy today’s short essay and that it brings a smile on what is an overcast day in Connecticut.

 

Sydney M. Williams

 

More Essay from Essex

“Superstitions…With a Smile”

March 11, 2023

 

“I had only one superstition. I made sure to

touch all the bases when I hit a home run.”

                                                                                                                           Attributed to Babe Ruth (1895-1948)

 

Edmund Burke (1729-1797), 18^th Century British statesman and philosopher, wrote in Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790), “Superstition is the religion of feeble minds.” I quote Burke as a warning about this essay, as I have long held superstitions (or some might, kindly, say “habits”).

 

While I don’t meditate each morning or watch the sunrise as I drink a smoothie, I do make sure a towel’s label is to the left when hung. With children and grandchildren flying around the world, I text, “safe flight” before their plane departs. When my wife takes a bath, I say, “be careful getting into and out of the tub.” I “knock on wood” most days and “cross my fingers” almost as often. On the first of the month, I text my children and grandchildren: “Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit,” which is supposed to bring good luck for the month. Why rabbits? Their feet, as talismans, date back to early Celtic tribes in Britain. I may be feeble-minded, but I feel better – perhaps because no rabbits had to sacrifice their feet.

 

My Random House Webster’s defines superstition as “an irrational belief in, or notion of, the ominous significance of a particular thing, circumstance, occurrence, etc.” Indicative of our times, the word has assumed more secular tones over the past 200 years. In 1828, Noah Webster (one of my thirty-two four-great grandfathers) defined the word: “Excessive exactness or rigor in religious opinions or practice; extreme and unnecessary scruples in the observance of religious rites…”

 

A good friend whose husband died a few years ago told her children that every time they saw a shiny penny it meant their father was with them in spirit. I now stay alert for shiny pennies; seeing one, I know that Michael is in the area. My mother-in-law used to say, if you drop a knife a man is coming. She wouldn’t say why, when, where, or who. My wife tells me that if I spill salt to toss a pinch of it over my left shoulder, which is where the devil (temptation) sits. An angel (conscience) resides on my right shoulders. When I fell and tore my rotator cuff last year, it was my right shoulder; so advantage, in my case, to the devil.

 

Superstitions have a long, literary history. They are found in Homer and the Bible. And who can forget the three witches who told MacBeth he would become Thane of Fife and then King. Witches were perceived as evil beings by early Christians. If a battle were lost, crops failed, or the cow got sick, it was the fault of a witch. Superstitions about witches in Salem caused the deaths of twenty-five, mostly older women, in 1692. Because witches were creative and intelligent women, my paternal grandmother once proudly told me that we descend from a witch. I like to think she was right.

 

Superstitions are not the same for everyone. Cracked mirrors distort reflections. Walking under a ladder is ill advised. Groucho Marx once said: “If a black cat crosses your path, it signifies that the animal is going somewhere.” And my wife tells me, as long as you can see the cat’s white teeth, all will be well.