Oh, hangman stay your hand

[venta]

I had meant to write lots about the folk festival I went to, at home in Darlington, at the weekend. But somehow I've not quite got round to it, and it's now days-old news. That's practically last decade on Livejournal.

However, two separate threads on other people's journals have got me thinking this afternoon. Firstly, edling was commenting on Cat's practice of knocking holes in eggshells to stop witches using them as boats. stompyboots pointed out it sounded like exactly the sort of thing I'd do - which I concede it does, though in actual fact it's not a superstition I'm aware of.

In general, my day-to-day life is hedged around with such habits and rituals. Whenever I put new bedclothes on the bed I deliberately tuck the bottom sheet round the foot-end of the mattress first, mentally hearing my mum's voice chanting first the foot and then the head, that's the way to make a bed. I put the pillow cases on the pillows, and turn the open ends away from the door to ensure I won't leave the bed in a coffin.

I let devils out of bread (as explained to Stompyboots), I avert a third crisis by breaking a matchstick, if the palms of my hands itch I rub them on wood to make sure my finances are safe. These things are so automatic that now, trying to list them, I can't think of many. When a magpie flies across in front of the car I bid it good morning, and enquire after its family, without even thinking about it.

As a passing digression, I haven't absorbed into my daily life superstitions which my parents didn't appear to go in for. I cheerfully walk under ladders, and I don't throw spilled salt over my shoulder. Thirteen seems quite a friendly number to me. I can think of at least one I believe I invented for myself - if I get out of bed during the night, I pull the bedclothes back over the place I've been lying to keep the devil out. I have no idea why this seemed necessary.

I should add, indicentally, that the devil isn't the chap who turns up in hellfire church sermons. The devils I try to avoid are the folk-story type, scheming, keen to enter into bargains with humanity, easily recognisable and none too bright.

And yet, in all this, I wouldn't describe myself as a superstitious person. Do I believe that failing to rub an itchy left palm against wood will result in me losing money ? (left for leave, right for receive). No, I don't.

Which leads me to the second thread, which was one of these answers-to-questions-about-myself posts. One question was "At what age did you find out that Santa Claus wasn't real?" I don't know my answer to that question. The obvious response is to cry "What ? He's not real ?"

Father Christmas is as real to me as he ever was; at Christmas I still put out my stocking (actually a small string bag made by my Dad) and when I wake up in the morning it contains small presents, wrapped in different paper from the giftwrap I or my parents are using that year. When I was younger (and went to bed before my parents on Christmas Eve) I used to leave out mince pie, sherry, and a carrot for the reindeer. Father Christmas was a very real figure, who would visit me if I'd been good.

And yet at the same time, some part of me wasn't really expecting that there was a real, tangible elderly gent hurtling through the sky to deliver parcels all over the world. I remember my nextdoor neighbour telling me that "it's just your parents really" - it didn't shock or surprise me, I already knew, had always known, and it didn't in any way stop me from believing firmly in Father Christmas. I still do.

I can believe six impossible things before breakfast; I can certainly believe two mutually contradictory things round afternoon-tea-time. The glib answer is, of course, to say something like "Well, it's all paradigms, innit?"

But no, I don't think it is. I don't consciously shift between the two views of the world, they co-exist quite happily in my mind. Neither is my "real" view of the world. Writing something like this is something of a struggle; I desperately want to prevent myself committing in writing somewhere that I concede that Father Christmas doesn't "really" exist, it goes against the face of me the world sees all the time.

Maybe the rich tapestry of folklore and myth is just something I've woven for myself in an attempt to impose order and justice on a world that seems to be sadly random. A sweet cloak to provide reasons for things, and to give me some hope of fending off the bad stuff. I prefer to think that the folklore is just something that's become engrained in me because I grew up with it, something I've retained because it makes the world that little bit more interesting.

My world is peopled with witches (possibly waterborne ones, since I leave eggshells unscuppered), devils, demons and countless other spirits. I take what precautions I can to keep the more malign ones at bay, and do my bit to ensure that the sun will come back each year and that the apple crops won't fail. Escapist ? Maybe. But it's a good world.

Comments

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

there's no 'real reason' (that we can find and justify and explain and reason through) why we touch wood for luck

There's no "real reason" why it's wood that we touch for luck, but I can think of a number of reasons why it's beneficial to have something to touch for luck. So the only problem is that it's arbitrary - it isn't nonsensical.

in this model you can have your own personal superstitions without anyone else knowing or caring

You can in mine - I should have said that it's "useful" that superstitions be cultural, because it's not vital, but I think it is an important property of cultural beliefs that even if you personally think they're a load of old rubbish, they're still real in Philip K. Dick's sense. This is why I know a surprising amount of trivia about Christianity for someone who doesn't believe a word of it - western society and culture and art are barely comprehesible in any other context.

The trouble with lone wolfing it in my model is that you have to make sure you "believe in" your superstition all by yourself, because there's nobody there to help you by reminding you that everyone throws salt over their shoulder, or looks both ways before crossing the road, or whatever ritual it is.

[metame.livejournal.com]

There's no "real reason" why it's wood that we touch for luck, but I can think of a number of reasons why it's beneficial to have something to touch for luck. So the only problem is that it's arbitrary - it isn't nonsensical.

I guess it's my feeling that superstitions are all about the arbitrary choices. You don't have a superstition to 'make yourself feel luckier/better using whatever means necessary', you have a set of very specific things which you do (and often that many other people do - cultural transmission of ideas, who'da thunk it?), because you think you should.

You break eggshells. You can then go off into a reasoning track that says you do it cos of the witches and the boats and the so on but the fact is you break eggshells. You don't feel the need to tear up grapefruit skins (even though much of the same reasoning track would be applicable). And that's the arbitrariness. And someone else might have it the other way round...

Incidentally (and this probably comes down more on 'your' side of this fence than mine) Jan Fries made the excellent point that if Faith healers are going to be able to benefit from a placebo effect from other faith healers it's far better for them to do something that seems mystical and that they don't understand the arbitrary details of than to do something mystical they've made up themselves. The effect on others should be similar, but if they can make themselves follow the rules passed down from generations past(TM) then they can benefit from the 'it's something none of us understands, but seems to work' placebo effect.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

You don't have a superstition to 'make yourself feel luckier/better using whatever means necessary'

No, but that can nevertheless the reason for the superstition even if it is not a superstition (which it might be, since belief in luck is rationally dubious in the first place). You don't consciously state this as your goal, but it is this desire which causes you to pick up the arbitrary specific example when it's offered.

I also vaguely remember someone who does "touch plastic", on grounds that nowadays it's easier to find close at hand. There are people who say "touch wood" and touch their head, which is either a sneaky piece of magick ("by saying that it is wood, I confer upon it the properties of wood") or else an acknowledgement that the idea of the game is to do something rather than to specifically do the right thing.

You can then go off into a reasoning track that says you do it cos of the witches and the boats and the so on but the fact is you break eggshells.

OK, but if you want to deny people their reasons for doing things, then this extends a lot further than superstitions. You can reason that you step out of the way of the bus because if you don't you'll die, but the fact is you step out of the way. You can reason that you vote Labour because it's better than the Tories getting in, but the fact is you vote Labour. And you can reason that you break eggshells either because of fear of witches, or because you enjoy acting against witches regardless of their reality, and in either case you break eggshells.

They may not be philosophically very satisfying, but reasons actually are quite important in analysing people's actions, and the one thing you can't do is say "for absolutely no reason at all, the fact is you break eggshells" because that makes no sense.

Superstitions are arbitrary because they don't have to have any particular measurable physical effect, not because they aren't done for a reason or because the reasons are abitrary.