Love and hate, what a beautiful combination

[venta]

[Poll #1598358]

Please vote before reading on!

According to me, such shivers are caused by a goose walking over your grave. ChrisC insists that this is nonsense, and that the mother exspelunca probably made it up (this is his reaction to approximately 85% of the things I say).

The other day Claudia - who is distressingly Continental, speaking around ten languages competently, and conversing fluently in English, her third language - shivered and blamed it on a goose walking over her grave. See! Colloquial English, as taught in the best Continental schools, was there to back me up! I began planning my victory dance. Depressingly, under questioning, Claudia cracked and admitted she'd got the phrase from me and was thus inadmissible as evidence.

At dance practice last night, I posed the question in the above poll. The crossing of graves was generally mentioned, but with the exception of one other person there was a lot of "A goose? A goose? Don't you mean ghost?"

Except for our youngest new recruit, who looked puzzled and said she wasn't dead yet, thus didn't have a grave. I've always presumed it actually refers to a goose crossing the future site of my burial (as yet unknown to me - or indeed to anyone except, apparently, goosekind).

Incidentally, if anyone has any non-grave-related explanations or, even better, any explanations from non-English-speaking countries I'd love to hear them. Despite her extensive education, Claudia was unable to produce any other countries' explanations. "I don't know. I guess you'd just say you shivered."

I ask you. Don't these Continentals have any imagination?

Comments

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

@sushidog - I promise I typed that without reading your answer! Spooky! ;-)

[feanelwa.livejournal.com]

Why would you bury a body where geese walk around? Wouldn't it contaminate the river?

I've heard "somebody walked over your grave" before, but not a ghost, goose, goat or any other being specifically beginning with g.

[phlebas.livejournal.com]

The goose has taken an early lead!

[boyofbadgers.livejournal.com]

Same here - always somebody, nothing more specific than that.

[huskyteer.livejournal.com]

I can imagine 'goose' being 'corrected' to 'ghost', a ghost making more sense in the context.

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Mine is definitely grave-related, but just 'someone' walking over the grave, not specifically a member of the family Anatidae.

[phlebas.livejournal.com]

Surely there is only one ghost who walks?

[lnr]

I hedged my bets with person/goose, but goose was the first thought!

[lnr]

Neatly kept graveyards are often grassy, and you do often see ducks at least on random bits of grass far from water, so perhaps a goose might do similar?

[venta.livejournal.com]

I actually think I've seen geese in churchyards before. Can't specifically call to mind where, though, so I may be making it up.

[lnr]

Oh look, perfect photo:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/28537042@N06/2915277934/in/pool-mementomori

[d-floorlandmine.livejournal.com]

Awesome reference!

(Even if it is Billy Zane in a purple wetsuit.)

[d-floorlandmine.livejournal.com]

Walking? I'm pretty sure you're buried on either a major hiking route, or under a folk-dancer's convention site, given the frequency. [grin]

[howlin-wolf-66.livejournal.com]

I've never heard of a goose... Whenever I've encountered it, the legend has always been non-fowl related...

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

Of course it doesn't make perfect sense. But it does have a certain logic to it.

Start with the idea that it's somehow bad to walk over a grave. Not too wacky an idea - it's (close to?) a human universal to be respectful around the dead, and walking on a person would be bad, so walking on a dead person is probably bad too. So, people avoid walking over graves. Except they can't see where your grave is, or rather, is going to be, so they don't know to avoid it. That's probably bad (though not hugely), and not too ridiculous to imagine some subtle effect being felt by you if you believe there's a tenuous connection between the next world and this one: some inadvertent disrespect to your future eternal resting place might well have some funny effect.

Goosebumps are when you get a bit cold or shivery and your hairs stand up - and they're *goose*bumps because your skin looks a bit like plucked gooseflesh.

Now, imagine you feel a slightly spooky shiver for no apparent reason, causing you goosebumps. "A goose walked over your grave" isn't quite so completely bonkers as an explanation.

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

It's usually given in phrase-and-fable as a back formation from goosebumps/pimples/flesh. I'm not sure how that explains the 'rabbit walked...' variant I just found, though. :)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Rabbits don't walk! They hop!

[venta.livejournal.com]

I think for politeness you want a future tense in there! I'm moderately sure valkyriekaren isn't buried yet. Unless I've got so goth I've started thinking corpses are pretty...

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

I know! It makes no sense. And that's clearly the bit to focus on in this whole mess. :D

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

Geese graze and are indeed often found in churchyards, historically speaking. I guess they are less disruptive than a goat. In small villages sparing the time to cut the grass properly via man-power will not necessarily have been feasible.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Hey, these things are important! It's all a matter of plausibility.

Geese might walk over graves and cause shivers - I have no direct evidence to the contrary. Besides, if you weren't willing to admit that sort of causal relationship, you'd probably say "I shivered"!

But rabbits don't walk. Demonstrably. I demand my old wives tales be more carefully observed!

:)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Almost certainly not relevant: a rather pompous-sounding 19thC chap (http://www.jstor.org/pss/3014222) reckons the Ancient Britons held it a crime to kill and eat goose.

Apparently geese also go in for astronomy, and are good at weather.

Also (still according to the same chap) they're very long lived, so could, er, be relied upon to outlive you and walk on your grave[*]. Except they're doing it now. So they don't need to. Er...


[*] I should point out, this conclusion is mine, not his.

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Ah, I had never thought it might be linked with goosebumps (or 'goosepimples' as I know them, but that's a whole nother line of inquiry). Makes sense.

Or of course it might just be propa-gander...
*rimshot*

[leathellin.livejournal.com]

Well neither my nor my mother (who is practically northern) think geese have anything to do with it.
So there :-)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Or of course it might just be propa-gander...

Please cite your sauce for that.

(I call them goosepimples, too.)

[j4.livejournal.com]

Definitely a goose! I've read it in books, next time I spot it I'll try to remember to tell you. :-)

I wonder if it is the same sort of goose that goosebumps come from...

[drdoug.livejournal.com]

There are some quacking good references in the works of Bill Shakespeare, waddle really make the point, although they are sometimes omitted in modern producktions.

[cardinalsin.livejournal.com]

Strangely enough, I nearly wrote "a goose walking over your grave" but then thought nahhh... that's silly, I must be misremembering.

[exspelunca.livejournal.com]

I voted before reading on, as requested and before I realised I'd have to have words with ChrisC. Re "someone" - isn't it considered a grave breach of etiquette to walk over a burial place? Maybe the discourtesy makes you shiver.

[ringbark.livejournal.com]

It doesn't make sense, goose or no. Where is my grave? AFAIK, I'm not in it yet, so anybody or anygoose walking over it won't matter yet.

Yes, I'm well aware it doesn't make any common sense. Can someone help me on this bit of uncommon nonsense?

[cuthbertcross.livejournal.com]

me too! Clearly a geek walked over our graves....

[zotz]

Geese?

You're all weird.

[mrlloyd.livejournal.com]

Maybe dates from the times Geese were used as guard dogs? So you might have had some in a cemetary to deter vandals?

[ulfilias.livejournal.com]

I've heard of someone walking over my grave, but never a goose !

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

Easy enough to test. Find people with relatively predictable future burial sites (e.g. with a spouse). Chuck a few geese over their probable grave. Check for shivers. Repeat with rabbits. Wait until everyone is dead, and compare two groups who did, and didn't, end up buried where expected.

Checking the ghosts is trickier, but if you phone Mythbusters and Most Haunted I'm sure they can get it done.