Category Archives: Folk Beliefs

Miracle During Birth and Visit from an Angel (Memorate)

Text

Informant (talking to daughter): “When you were born, they took you away to check you. They did a scan and they said there were calcifications in your brain. I was really sad and really worried, plus you were premature— you were born early— so you were really tiny, you needed oxygen and all different things. But anyway, when I was in my bed in the hospital, I was crying because I was just sad and I had been worried about you and I was sleeping. In the middle of the night, I felt a smooth whisper of wind go across the side of my left cheek and a Voice said, “Trust and believe.” It woke me up out of my sleep and I was like, ‘Oh my god, oh my god,’ so I rang for the nurse and I said ‘Was somebody here in my room?’ The nurse said ‘No, nobody came into your room we’ve been sitting out here.’ And I said, ’But I heard somebody I heard a voice, I felt them.’ The nurse said this was the cancer ward prior and you’re not the first person who has felt things on this floor. So somebody was there and somebody wanted me to be okay. The next day, they took you in for scans again and the calcifications were gone.”

Context

The Informant is a 48-year-old Black-American woman who is having a conversation with her daughter about the girl’s birth. This story is from the Informant’s personal experience. Informant believes this was an interaction with an angel, rather than a “ghost” or “spirit.”

Analysis

Similar to other memorates I collected, this spiritual experience took place when the Informant was sleeping. The dream space seems to be a common realm for spiritual contact and connection. The Informant’s experience also took place during a significant life event (birth) and time of uncertainty (medical complication). During emotional turmoil, the words “trust and believe” communicate faith and signify guidance. This may be a reason why the Informant classifies the Voice as an “angel” rather than a “ghost “or “spirit.” The reversal of fortune shortly after, when the baby’s medical complications magically resolve, could be another reason why the Informant perceives this as a divine interaction. 

“Quiet” Jinx in Nursing

Nationality: American

Primary Language: English

Age: 19

Occupation: Student

Residence: Los Angeles, CA

Text

“So basically if it’s a calm night, never say it’s a calm night or shift, there’s a specific name for it but I don’t know what it is, oh right it’s “a quiet night”. “It sure is a quiet night” that’s how you immediately destroy everything, especially on the ambulance, never say that it’s a quiet night.”

Context

This piece of nursing superstition is something which NA has heard from her mother, where they believe that saying it’s a “quiet night” will lead to the shift/night immediately turning very chaotic. She believes in the superstition “in a funny way” and she thinks it’s ironic but true. Both of NA’s parents have experience in the medical field, and she said that she’s heard multiple stories of them personally experiencing this phenomenon and that they both believe the word holds power. 

Analysis

This superstition is one that I know exists in many emergency services such as hospitals, firefighters, emts, etc. Many truly believe that saying the word “quiet” would cause everything to become chaotic, contrary to the word’s meaning. Because this belief in the power of the phrase is strengthened by experience, this superstition is something which unites people within the who have all shared this experience. 

Lucky Horseshoe

Text:

“My grandparents on my mom’s side have a horseshoe hung up over the front door of their house. The horseshoe is supposed to both bring good luck and keep away bad luck or curses. It always has to be hung with the ends pointing up, so it can act like a cup to catch the good luck, and if it is hung upside down the good luck will spill out.”

“Do you follow the same tradition? Would you hang a horseshoe over your door?”

 “I don’t know if I would. My grandmother gave me a horseshoe keychain as a gift a while back. I don’t really believe in the superstition aspect of it, but it’s a way for me to feel connected to her so it has become a charm in a way for me.”

Context: My informant is a friend of mine who has Irish heritage on his mother’s side, where he first learned of the horseshoe superstition. He says that no one he knows shares the horseshoe superstition, but that it is more prevalent in Ireland and other European countries. While he does not necessarily believe in the superstition, it is clear that the practice on his mother’s side has made it an important part of the connection to his family. 

Analysis: 

The horseshoe superstition described by my informant has an interesting combination of both personal sentiment and cultural tradition. Even though my informant does not believe the superstition and may not continue it, the fact that the superstition was embedded in a gift from his grandmother highlights the deeper importance of superstitions and traditions. By gifting my informant with the horseshoe, his grandmother was using superstition as a way to give good fortune to my informant. This suggests that superstitions can be used to soothe worries and help us feel secure and optimistic for our loved ones. Additionally, my informant’s view of the gift shows the ability of cultural traditions and superstitions to be modified to fit the individual. While more broadly the horseshoe may represent attracting good luck and warding off evil, because it was a gift in good heart from his grandmother, the horseshoe transforms into a symbol of love and family connection between my informant and his grandmother.

Mid Autumn Festival

My informant usually celebrates this with family, and the date depends on the lunar calendar, but is typically in the autumn and is always the night of a full moon.

During this festival you typically gaze at and appreciate the moon and eat mooncakes. Mooncakes are typically sweet pastries but they can be savory with a variety of different fillings from date to a sweet nut paste to lotus paste and salted egg yolk.

This festival is celebrated because of a Chinese myth with many variations. The basic story is that a woman ended up drinking an immortality elixir that would have brought her to heaven, but her husband was still on earth. Because of this she chose to live on the moon instead so in the mid autumn festival, moon gazing is like how every year the husband would eat mooncakes and look for his wife on the moon. Due to this, the festival is generally a family activity.

The story itself can depend but in a few variations my informant is pretty sure that they were once gods, but the husband had to shoot down several suns (which were the children of the emperor of the sky) and as punishment the couple were turned into humans. However, they received the elixir at some point and wanted to split it to be together, but they had to wait until the full moon for the effect to work, but one month the husband was away and someone attacked the wife for the elixir so she drank it so the attacker wouldn’t get it.

This festival is based on a myth based on the cycles of the moon. Not only is the meaning based on the moon, but the food eaten is also moon based

“Bread and Butter” (Splitting the Pole)

• saying/banisher of bad luck

Many people subscribe to the superstition that “splitting the pole,” or in other words, walking on two different sides of a (usually tall and inanimate) object, i.e. a pole, is bad luck–sometimes promising a split in the pair’s relationship, poor fortune, or even death for one or both parties, according to different beliefs. 

Of course, for various reasons, sometimes it is impossible for two people to avoid splitting the pole, in which case one of them must say “bread and butter” to undo the bad luck. This is presumably tied to the idea that splitting the pole will cause the two to separate in some way, and butter can’t really be separated from bread once spread. 

While there is limited written documentation/proof, because the superstition around splitting the pole seems to have originated among Black Americans, many point to the context of slavery, the life-or-death need for enslaved people to stay together and seek protection in numbers, and the ever-present threat of external parties dividing them from loved ones. 

However, “bread and butter” makes even physical separation powerless, restoring the protective powers of community, especially in travel.