Tag Archives: Rituals, festivals, holidays

“Bloody Mary” Test of Courage

Main Piece:

B: So when I was in kindergarten or first grade, during recess my friends and I would play four-square. So, I was- there’s a line and I was waiting in the line to play. And I heard two boys talking about Bloody Mary. They said you have to say “bloody mary” three times into a mirror, and then she comes out or something.

Me: Could you do this in any mirror or did you have to go in a specific room?

B: You had to do it in the bathroom. But I tried it and nothing happened (laughs the kind of laugh you do when you try something silly).

Me: Why do you think kids tell each other this story?

B: I think part of the reason is because they want to scare each other. And I feel like part of it is also that, they got told it and they got scared, and they want other people to know because they want them to be aware or something.

Me: What thoughts did you have when you tried this?

B: I didn’t have any thoughts, I was like, I’m gonna do this, and I went in the bathroom and turned off the lights and shut the door, and then I started saying it? And then I was like, “this is fake,” and went back out.

Background: 

My informant is my cousin’s 10-year-old son, who is in the fourth grade. He lives in a suburban neighborhood near Des Moines, which is the capital of Iowa. He goes to a public elementary school in his district, where he heard this story. He then tested the theory in the bathroom at his own house. He insinuates that he was never fearful of this story nor did he believe it, and carries this tone throughout his telling of it. 

Context:

This is a transcript of our conversation over the phone. Lately, he has been telling me stories about what goes on during school, though this conversation was prompted specifically for this collection project. I was curious about whether his generation still knew about bloody mary.

Thoughts: 

I was pretty surprised that “Bloody Mary” is still an ongoing tradition/ritual for kids in my informant’s generation. In class, we learned about Dundes’ theory on Bloody Mary’s connection to fears about menstruation in young girls, which explained why so many of my female classmates also knew about this ritual, and how they learned of it when they were in elementary or middle school. Thus, I was slightly surprised that my cousin’s son also knew about Bloody Mary, and that he learned about it from other boys. In this instance, the story of Bloody Mary doesn’t seem to attest to girls’ fears about menstruation, which is a potentially scary and traumatic first experience if not well-prepared for it, but rather, a sort of test of courage for boys. My informant’s commentary on the reason the story is told, which is that the relayer was scared themselves, suggests that some fear may be alleviated when the story is passed onto another person. The act of trying it, then, tests your courage to face this alleged horrifying sight of a bloody woman, which fully alleviates your fear when nothing happens.

For Dundes’ work on Bloody Mary, see:

Dundes, Alan. Bloody Mary in the Mirror: Essays in Psychoanalytic Folkloristics. University Press of Mississippi, 2002. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt2tvfn2. Accessed 1 May 2021. 

Cover mirror at night

BACKGROUND: My informant, MT, is a Mexican-American born in the US. Her parents are both immigrants from Mexico and speak Spanish. I asked MT if she had any familial superstitions or rituals that she wanted to talk about and she brought up this one. Despite not being very spiritual or religious, MT does this ritual every night. 

CONTEXT: This piece is from a text conversation with my friend to discuss superstition in her family.

MT: I have to cover all of my mirrors at night because my mom said ghosts and spirits can enter our world through them. 

Me: Do you have to use a specific thing to cover it?

MT: I just use a blanket and toss it over.

THOUGHTS: This belief was interesting to me because during my conversation with another friend about folk beliefs I heard about the same ritual only carrying an entirely different meaning. My friend of Irish heritage mentioned that his family always thought that mirrors and photographs can trap souls. Hence when a loved one dies, they cover up mirrors so their soul isn’t trapped in their reflection. It’s interesting however how both cultures associate mirrors and reflections with spirits.

Swim Team Bleaches Their Hair

Background: 

My informant, AK, is a 19 year old student at the University of Michigan. She was born and raised in Southern California and is studying engineering. While in high school, AK was an active member and team captain of her school’s swim team. She attended the school from kindergarten until she graduated and knew the place inside and out. (I’ll be referring to myself as SW in the actual performance).

Performance: 

AK: Every year, the guys on the swim team would bleach their hair. I’m not really sure why, but no one ever questioned it, it was just kind of what they did. Maybe it was so they looked more unified before league finals. 

Thoughts:

I hadn’t realized until after I came to college, but the swim team bleaching their hair at the end of the season was not unique to AK and I’s high school. In fact, it was common practice all across the country. Others I’ve spoken to about this can’t explain the reasoning either, but they all do it. While I would like to know the reason why, I think it’s kind of special for this tradition to be so widespread. This is something that anyone who swam in high school can relate to and remember and bond over. This is an excellent example of how folklore connects people who may not connect otherwise. 

The Ritual Game: One Man Hide-and-Seek

Interviewer: Okay so how do you play this game?

Informant: Well as the name suggests you have to do this alone, while everyone is out of the house, preferably. You take an old doll that you don’t like anymore, cut it open and remove all the stuffing. Then fill it up with white rice. Once the doll is totally full of rice, cut a hair from your head and poke it into the heart of the doll’s body. Then take a knife and prick a finger, doesn’t matter which one, and wipe the blood onto the rice protruding from the doll’s back. Once you’ve done that, take a bit of red string and sew up the back of the doll and cut it off with the same knife you used to prick your finger. Once it’s sewn up give it a name, and it has to be a name that no one you know has.

Interviewer: Sounds like you have to be very careful during all this prep work.

Informant: Oh yeah and we’re not even done yet. Actually playing the game is specific too. You then have to take the finished doll to a bathroom, run a shallow bath, and then place the doll in the water. Turn out all the lights in the house, finding a hiding spot and count to ten. You shouldn’t forget to take the knife with you when you go to hide. Say ‘ready or not here I come’ then go back to the doll. Repeat ‘I found you, I found you, I found you’ then ‘you’re the next it, you’re the next it, you’re the next it’ and tie the knife to the doll’s hand. Then go to hide again, it doesn’t have to be in the same place. If you make it to sunrise, you’ve won the game.

Interviewer: Do you get anything out of winning?

Informant: No, I don’t think so. You just get bragging rights.

Interviewer: What happens if you lose?

Informant: The doll kills you, supposedly. But if you need to stop the game, like if the doll finds you, it’s recommended that you always have a glass of salt water prepared to pour on the doll. When you pour the water, shout ‘I win, I win, I win’ then the game is over.

Background: One Man Hide and Seek was part of a film project that she was doing for school. She researched this game but does not remember which sites she learned it from or its origin.

Context: I was interviewing my informant for rituals that she learned about through research and hearsay from others. She was happy to tell me about this one since it resulted in one of her favorite movies that she made.

Thoughts: I severely doubt that the original reason for doing One Man Hide and Seek was just so one could have bragging rights, so it must have been a ritual for something else originally. I did a little digging online and found a site that suggests the ritual was originally posted on a ‘Japanese horror bulletin board.’

Please see “One-Man Hide and Seek / Hide and Seek Alone.” Know Your Meme Accessed March 20, 2020

The Ritual Game: The Midnight man

Informant: It’s some ritual that was apparently used to punish bad people somewhere in Europe. The ritual starts at 3 AM and you need a candle, a piece of paper, and your front door. You write your name on the piece of paper then put it outside the door under a lit candle. Knock on the door 12 times and make sure it is EXACT, and make sure to get the last knock to stop at 3AM. Then open the door, pick up the paper and the candle and the game has begun. It lasts until 6 AM, so it’s only three hours but you have to keep your candle lit for all that time. The Midnight Man will try to blow out the candle or scare you into dropping it. Your candle is your only source of light so it’s pretty easy to get super scared. If your candle goes out and you cannot relight it within 5 seconds then surround yourself in a circle of salt and sit there until morning. Do not under any circumstances turn on a light! Both of these things are ways of forfeiting the game but that doesn’t mean the Midnight Man leaves. He haunts you until you complete the game.

Interviewer: So what do you get for winning the game?

Informant: I think you get to make a wish and it will comes true.

Interviewer: So what happens if you lose?

Informant: He kills you, obviously. [laughs]

Background: My informant had done research into different dark ritualized games such as this for a film projection she was doing. She did not end up using this game as the final inspiration for her movie.

Context: My informant and I were staying up late on the night of the 19th, just finishing playing video games together. We were walking through the house in the dark and she tried to scare me with this scary ritual, saying that she was going to do it.

Thoughts: I imagine the combination of sleep deprivation, lack of light, and the general atmosphere of being in an empty house would make for a fun time. Apparently this can be played with multiple people at one time so you could probably mess around with each other a great deal. With that in mind, I suspect this actually could have been a punishment ritual, though I am unsure where it would be used. The game could be turned into a form of psychological torture to get people to confess to crimes by making them think a demon was coming to kill them anyway.