Just Spit on the Magpie's Curse
October 2003
Have you ever thought how long ago our parents and grandparents were controlled by superstitions? If mother dropped a knife on the kitchen floor, that meant a man coming and she lived in terror in case it was the landlord.
If she dropped a fork, that meant a lady visitor, and she at once took out her girdle in case she hadn’t enough scones in the tin. Worse still, if she dropped a spoon, that was bad luck and she’d spend the rest of the day worrying what evil would befall her.
To see a black cat was lucky but not if it crossed your path on a Friday; that meant a tragedy. Similarly, a cock crowing before daylight had broken meant a death in the family.
I wonder what our forebears looked upon as really good luck? Certainly no thoughts of winning the lottery then. But a good hatch of healthy chickens from the clockin’ hen would have been wonderful; or if the baker on the van had some broken biscuits to sell off cheaply.
Better still, to have your early tatties ready to lift before the neighbours. Now that really was a stroke of good luck!
To walk under a ladder was unlucky; for a tin of paint might land on your head. And one magpie, oh dear, try not to look at it, for needless to say, it too was an evil omen, but not if you crossed your fingers and spat. Two magpies, though, brought joy.
When peeling an apple it was important to try and take the skin off in one piece, then throw it over your left shoulder and work out which initial the peel had made as it landed on the kitchen floor. That was the initial of the name of your future husband or wife. Woe betide you if the initial couldn’t be made out; I’m afraid that meant you’d be left on the shelf – a calamity in those far-away days.
Snowdrops were never allowed in our house, nor was lilac, although we all sang and enjoyed that lovely song, We’ll Gather Lilacs in the Spring Again. But all was not doom and gloom. Surely something would cheer us up and bring us good luck? Yes, find a four-leafed clover and a happy time would follow. We would take it home and press it carefully in a heavy book, quite often the Bible, and there it would stay for us to look at if we were feeling down at mouth. It assured us there was a good time coming.
It was also considered lucky to see a spider in the house – but it must never be killed, for that brought rain, and no one wanted rain, especially during harvest time.
To find a threepenny dodger was very lucky, as was finding a discarded horse shoe on our rough country roads.
Can I possibly have inherited any of these old beliefs? Well, I still dislike seeing anyone place shoes on a table, or spill the salt – although that is easily rectified by throwing a pinch over your left shoulder. I must never see a new moon through glass, or as my favourite MP of all time, the late Bob Boothby, used to say: “Worse still to see it through an empty glass.”
Winnie Carnegie, who lives in Torphins, is the author of Ugie Pearls and other short stories and poems. In her new book, Pansies for Thoughts [Carnugie, £6.95], illustrated by her daughter Lin Brown, Winnie spins her own special magic. She tells stories and rhymes about her life, which spans nearly a century – stories of finding a puddock on the doorstep, of the death of her best friend, of her pride in her grandchildren, of looking at her passport photo:
TweetCan that be me? Oh, surely no,
The camera maun be faulty.
Ma heid’s ower big, my nose sticks oot
Jist like the tap o’ Scolty.
This is an article from the October 2003 edition of Leopard Magazine. To read much more like this every month, subscribe to Leopard Magazine.