Informant: The informant is Janet, a fifty-six-year-old woman from Yonkers, New York. She has lived in the Bronx and Westchester County, New York throughout her entire life. She is of Italian descent, is married, and has two children.

Context of the Performance: We sat next to each other on a couch in the living room of her house in Yonkers, New York over my spring break from college.

Original Script:

Informant: When you enter a building or home, I was taught that you must exit from the same door you entered through. Doing so would ensure that you avoid bad luck, which you would receive if you were to exit through a different door. I learned this piece from Joan DeLuca, a longtime friend whose children attended the same elementary school mine. We were together at a friend’s house for dinner. Joan made sure to leave from the same door we entered through and explained the idea to me.

Interviewer: Why do you like this piece? Why is it important to you?

Informant: I like this piece because I’m very superstitious and feels safer following this routine. If I didn’t, I would feel very uncomfortable. It would haunt me. This piece is very important to me because I feel that if I were to exit through a different door and something unfortunate were to occur, whether it be something small like tripping or major like a death, I would blame it on my foolishness of not exiting through the same door.

Personal Thoughts: I find this piece of folklore to be quite intriguing because she feels so strongly about this superstition. She would truly blame herself for an unfortunate event, were it to occur after she exited through a different door from the one through which she entered a building or home. There seems to be a balance which must be met to avoid bad luck within a lot of folklore. If you do one thing, you must eventually turn around and go back to “make it even” in a sense, or balance it out.