Hi everyone! I hope you’re all well. Today is Wednesday, and it’s time for another post in the Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge hosted by Long and Short Reviews. If you’d like to participate in the challenge, you can find the list of topics for 2024 here. If you’re interested in reading other people’s responses to this week’s topic, you can do so here.
Superstitions I Secretly Believe In/Find Interesting
Although I am not a superstitious person by any means, my Nanna was. You couldn’t open an umbrella indoors, wear a hat indoors, or walk under ladders. She would never light candles because she thought our family had such a run of bad luck over the years that one tiny tealight was sure to burn her house down.
She knocked on wood whenever anyone was waiting for good news, and if she had nothing made of wood to hand, she would knock on her skull — you know, that part of the body famously not made of wood…
On her garden gate, she had my grandad nail a horseshoe to offer good luck and, probably, to counteract the bad luck from the black cat down the street who always seemed to choose my Nanna’s garden to do its business in.
One of the superstitions she passed down to me is taking down the Christmas tree on New Year’s Day, but for me, it’s more about tradition than superstition. We all tend to do it now.
I should point out that my Nanna invented this superstition. It first came about after the death of her mother. It’s thought to be bad luck for Catholics to take the tree down before or after Twelfth Night (the sixth of January — also the feast of the Epiphany). However, her mother died on the fifth of January, and they thought it would be in bad taste to leave the tree up while their family was grieving.
Every year after that, their tree came down on New Year’s Day because my Nanna had become convinced it would somehow bring about good luck to start the year in a home uncluttered by holiday decorations.
There are so many of these things that my Nanna did that I’d be here all day if I were to list them all. I’ve never believed in any of them, but it sure was interesting watching my Nanna do everything she could to invoke a sense of good luck around her home. Hilariously… she never thought she was superstitious.
As always, thank you for stopping by to read my words. I appreciate it.
Until next time,
George
© 2024 GLT
Categories: life, Wednesday Weekly Blogging Challenge
GEORGE L THOMAS 
I love the fact that your Nanna invented her own superstition. That’s great.
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Haha! Thanks, Lydia!
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There’s a funny meme relying on Downton Abby which is popular with Catholics around Christmas. It depicts Lady Mary saying, “The tree states up until Epiphany. You’ll get used to the way things are done around here — properly.” I’m not on my home PC (where it’s saved), but here’s another version of it:
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b3/cd/1c/b3cd1cb8de4f58f72975505379d07d2c.jpg
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Yes! It seems a long time after Christmas to leave a tree up to me, but then again, mine goes up a long time before, so I can hardly judge 🙂
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My parents were strict “up the weekend after Thanksgiving, down Christmas 26” people, but my sensibilities are more like meme-Lady Mary’s.
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I love all your reminiscence about your Nanna
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Aw, thanks, Greta! She’s still a big miss.
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If you count the 12 days of Christmas, the 12th day is the 5th of January, so our tree always comes down before the 5th (never on the 6th). And now it seems that the thinking is 12th night is the 5th January. It’s strange to think that for many years, so many people got their sums wrong counting to 12 from the 25th December. (the first day of Christmas). No wonder so many people had bad luck if they took the tree down on the night of the 6th.
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I like the “touch wood” joke too. It’s another one that’s not a superstition in my family, but is a longstanding joke. I *always* say “Touch wood!” and touch my head…don’t even look for an actual piece of wood.
At a party that overcrowded someone’s living room once, a young man folded himself up into the grate and sat in the fireplace, head not quite up the nice clean chimney, and said he thought his head would fit best in the place where the wood belonged. I thought he was being polite to someone who’d invited more bodies than fitted into her living room.
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