Tag Archives: driving

Lifting your feet over the drawbridge

Interviewer: “Ever since I could remember, whenever we drove over a drawbridge, you always told my brother and me to lift our feet over a drawbridge. Could you please explain why?”

D: “It’s always been that way. My dad had told me my whole life as well; it was just a thing, you cross over a drawbridge, so you lift your feet. I had to pass it on to my family as well.”

Interviewer: “Do you have any idea what it means, why you do it?”

D: “It’s for luck, not necessarily luck for your day, but more so luck for your future drives. You don’t want your feet touching the car floor when you feel the bumpy road from the texture of the bridge. Even I lift my feet up. Sure, I’ll have a little bit on the gas pedal, but otherwise I’m lifting my feet until the road is flat again.”

Context: Ever since I was a little kid I remeber driving with my dad. Anytime we would pass over a draw bridge, you had to lift your feet up. No matter how long or short the bumps of the bridge lasted. He would start with a warning by saying “ok get ready to lift your feet up!” and then when we hit the bridge said “Go!” and everyone in the car would lift both their feet off of the ground. Sometimes it would be difficukt to hold them up for a while – as an impatient child, but it would be over soon enough, and no way was anyone letting their feet touch the car floor. As soon as the car left the brdige he would say “good” and everyone would put their feet back down immediatly. I am unsure where this supersition came from, but from the interview I gathered my dad had done it his own life and took it on from his dad. My grandpa would say it to all of his 9 kids whenever passing over a draw bridge. This would take place most often from the drives from upstate NY to NYC, but happened anytime there was a drawbridge.

Analysis: This tradition is a form of family folklore that uses superstition and ritual to create a shared sense of meaning during an otherwise ordinary activity. The act of lifting feet over a drawbridge, framed as bringing “luck” for future drives, reflects how belief does not need a clear origin or logic to feel important. This supersition not only prvoides luck for the rest of the drive and future drives, but acts as a shared identity within the family.

Running Over Lemons

Nationality: American
Age: 20
Occupation: Student
Language: Tamil & English

Text:

Driving over lemons with a newly purchased vehicle.

SB: We place a lemon under every tire of a vehicle we just bought, and then we drive it over so we crush all of the lemons, so it’s as if all the lemons are taking the brunt of the bad luck that the new vehicle might be running into in the future. It’s a preventive measure type of thing…because all the lemons have taken the bad luck, you’re not supposed to step onto a crushed lemon you see on the street because all that bad luck could transfer to you.

Context:

SB is uncertain about the tradition’s origins or what the exact context is. However, she mentions that in in Hinduism, “when you visit a temple, sometimes you break open a coconut, and I’m assuming it has some similar things in terms of destroying these fruits.” She connects breaking these fruits as physical acts of removing bad luck, and she iterates that her family does this whenever they get a new vehicle.

Analysis:

In situations where we feel like we don’t have control, we often try to assert authority through superstitious beliefs. While they may not be scientifically accepted, they can be held true by a community and naturally embed itself into familial tradition. Specifically, when we buy a new vehicle, there’s a lot we may not know: the ins and outs of how the car drives, what it’s like to drive the car amidst a bustling highway, and other factors that could influence our sense of security. When we drive, our lives are in the hands of everyone else on the road. These acts to ensure safe driving can remove the stress from a very anxiety-inducing activity for some people.

There are many driving rituals that exist to prevent bad luck or appreciate good luck, such as holding your breath when passing a graveyard or hitting the dashboard when narrowly escaping a yellow light. Despite laws and policies that attempt to keep our roads safe, institutions can’t really dictate belief. So much of this unofficial knowledge and these individual and communal rituals blossom from a desire to claim more direct control and exercise our personal beliefs. There is no law that tells us how to magically bring upon good luck, and there is no science supporting some of these rituals, but we believe in them anyway and engage in these practices to add an extra layer of security.

Hit the ceiling on Yellow lights

Date: April 20, 2022 

Source and Relationship: T, best friend

Type: Superstition, Tradition

Folklore/ Text: Hit the Roof on Yellow Lights: “Since I’ve had my car, I always knew I wanted to do some weird little traditions with it. I thought it was a right of passage to have your own superstitions about driving. Basically, one day I was watching some movie with Brad Pitt in it and the character driving had to speed to make it through a yellow light, and when he did, he punched the ceiling of his car. They never really explained why he did that but I thought it was awesome so now I do it for good luck. All my friends have learned to do it with me when we’re in the car together too, which is great, because that means extra good luck.”

Explanation/Context: I love this superstition of T’s because it is so specific to her and I’s friendship together, so much so that I’ve found myself doing it in my own car for good luck. Our entire friend group knows about how spooked out T gets about angel numbers and specific street signs, so it only makes sense that we all participate in this strange ritual each time we narrowly escape a red light. I feel it has a placebo effect, as someone who is not superstitious, but nonetheless it provides her comfort and a semblance of safety when driving along Los Angeles roads, which superstitions often do. 

Jeep Wave

Main Piece:

So my thing is more of a gesture. It’s kind of something that happens and I didn’t know about it till after I got my car. But basically, once you get the Jeep, there’s something known as a Jeep wave. And so basically it’s with, I don’t really know, like, I think there are different variations of how you do it. But the one I was told is that you put one hand and one hands on the wheel, and it’s just like, three of your fingers are just like couple your fingers up. And it’s the idea is if you see a Jeep, like driver and you and you’re driving your Jeep and you’ll see each other you do a Jeep wave. And it’s a form of like a community type thing, but like it’s really just like a wave that you do. So

Relationship to the Piece:

My informant has driven a Jeep for the last few years and was told this by his friend who also drove a Jeep and it’s become a way for him to connect to his community of Jeep drivers, especially as he recently began to drive his Jeep around LA. 

Context: 

My informant is a 19-year-old BFA lighting design student at the University of Southern California and I was told this as we were hanging out in a theatre on campus swapping tales of folklore. 

Analysis:

I’d never heard of the Jeep wave, but I think it makes sense, as especially in America, the cars we drive often become aspects of our identity, especially with all the stereotypes we associate with certain makes and models of vehicles. It makes sense that a little community would form around certain cars, but it also creates questions, like who began the gesture and how it spreads. 

Lifting Your Legs Over Train Tracks for Good Luck

Nationality: American
Age: 61
Occupation: Dog Trainer
Residence: San Diego, CA
Performance Date: 03/07/20
Primary Language: English

Context: The informant and I were driving in the car when we passed over train tracks and she told me the piece. The piece was collected in its natural performance setting.

Background: The informant is my mother, who is a third generation Irish immigrant. She learned the piece as a child from her parents who would say it when passing over train tracks.  

Piece:

“Lift your legs for good luck!” 

Analysis: I grew up hearing this piece from my mom every time we drove over train tracks. Neither one of us knows why it is good luck, but I believe it is an exercise in controlling something tangible to control the intangible. Train tracks can be dangerous places. By lifting our legs, perhaps we are attempting to subvert this danger. Some variants of this practice involve lifting one’s legs in order to prevent them from being chopped off by the train tracks while other variants threaten that if one does not lift their legs, they will die young.

For another variant of this practice visit:

Edelen, John. “Lifting Feet Over Train Tracks.” USC Digital Folklore Archives. University of Southern California, May 13, 2019. http://uscfolklorearc.wpenginepowered.com/?p=47643.