Of Superstitions, Odd Beliefs and Various Miscellanea

Virtually every community within society at large subscribes to some type of strange belief, superstition, unfounded fear or simply warnings. Some of those I grew up with stemmed from the deep, enigmatic pages of the Jewish Talmud. Others, from my father's Slavic roots or our Italian neighbor's parents.

1. Pregnant women should not step on fingernails for it may lead to miscarriage or other harm to the unborn baby. This is discussed in the Talmud, and Jewish law warns that cut fingernails should be burned or buried. Standard practice in our home was to flush them down the toilet, which is an adequate way of disposing them. A schoolfriend of mine was overly fanatic when it came to this belief. I had (and still have) a nail biting habit, and when she saw me carelessly discard a nail onto the school bathroom floor, she immediately scrunched down, trying to locate the nail and any other nails that could be found. 'That's disgusting' I told her 'But it can be dangerous!' She pontificated ' pregnant teachers might come in here!' I told her that teachers had their own bathroom, but she carried on in hot pursuit of stranger's fingernails.

2. Empty bottles should not remain on the table. When I met my husband, I noticed that whenever a bottle was emptied, he would take it and place it beneath the table, or somewhere out of sight. I thought this really odd, so I asked why he was doing it. 'And empty bottle is a bad sign!' he said. 'Bad sign for what?' I inquired further... "It's a sign that we're all out of drinks!' he replied in jest. My guess is that the superstition stems from situations when times were harder and food not easy to come upon.

3. One must not sit directly in front of the table corner. I have no idea where this comes from but have heard it a lot over the years. A Google search has informed me that this is a Russian superstition related to delaying marriage for seven years.

4. Onions must not be left overnight without a head (namely, use the whole onion!). I think this has something to do with demons visiting at night when all are asleep and infiltrating some foods.

5. It is customary in may Jewish communities not to name the child before he or she is born, and not to buy anything at all before the birth so as to avoid the evil eye. No baby showers here! Some don't find out the gender of the baby for the very same reason, not for the surprise factor.

6. In some parts of the world, Jews wear red thread bracelets to ward off the evil eye.

7. In school, I learned from the other children that one was not supposed to step over another person. If you did so, you had to step over him again so as to ward off whatever it was that could happen. Thus, it was always a constant stepping over, stepping back again, arguing over who stepped over whom and how many times, and so on and so forth. I recall this with great hilarity, I cannot believe how serious we were about it!

8. Blowing out candles is like blowing out a soul. My grandfather used matchboxes to efficiently extinguish the flames.

9. Opening umbrellas in the house brings bad luck. That says it all!

10. Spilling the pepper means you will have a fight with your best friend. This Italian superstition was often repeated to us by one of our teachers at lunchtime. The funny thing is, there was any pepper on the table. We were children after all.

11. The color purple, passing under a staircase, the numbers thirteen and seventeen and black cats all harbor bad luck. The purple might be exclusively Italian in origin, though I am not sure.

12. Swallowing your fingernails will cause your appendix to rupture: there may be an element of truth to this, but I'm sure it was used on me solely as a scare tactic. The latest, from my husband: shelling sunflower seeds with your teeth may cause you to swallow parts of the shell and cause your appendix to rupture.

Isn't it a miracle we're all still alive and well?