When my husband and I first became engaged, he warned me that a mysterious force called “The Sieghart Luck” followed him everywhere. Not being a natural born Sieghart, I was unfamiliar with this phenomenon, but after an explanation, I determined that “Murphy’s Law” had undergone a simple name change.
You know Murphy. He the one who makes sure that if anything can go wrong, it will.
I was raised somewhat superstitiously. We didn’t have to go as far as avoiding sidewalk cracks or midnight black cats, but my mom does have a list of bizarre happenings that are rumored to cause ill fortune. My mom and her friend used to be quite interested in psychics and having their fortunes told and once, when helping to clean out the “gone out of business” bookstore where I worked, I came across a box of tarot cards on the back of a shelf. The box was quite damaged, but the cards were intact and quite pretty, I thought and my boss told me to just take them home. I thought my mother would like them.
She didn’t.
After an inquisition as to how exactly I obtained them, she went fleeing into the night in her pajamas to remove the cards from our home. What she did with them, I don’t know, but I was told never to touch tarot cards that have “found” me. In order to avoid similar curses, we we were never allowed to play with Ouija boards, either.
With the exception of the Ouija board thing that I just can’t seem to shake, I prefer to live on the wild side of superstitions. I don’t believe that a broken mirror will bring you any more misfortune than “The Sieghart Luck” or that the stem of a four leaf clover will point you to a magical, gleaming pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.
Still, I do have to admit that “The Sieghart Luck” has been quite present, generally causing such harmless shenanigans as breaking the oven on a major holiday when twenty hungry people are sitting in my living room or taunting us with a quick pick lottery ticket bearing six numbers with each a single number away from the winning digits. I didn’t think much of it until “it” happened a few months back.
I was out with friends one night, having a good time dancing when I caught the eye of an acquaintance. She had an eerie stare and an unexpected, indescribable feeling of dread seemed to overtake me for a second.
Along with tarot card curses, I had heard stories of something that could cause one great harm...The Evil Eye. Some people, I suppose, were rumored to have this power and able to give a look that was capable of inflicting injury or bad luck for the person to whom it was directed. My Mexican relatives would call this “mal do ojo” and it’s serious business.
I chose to forget about it, particularly since I don’t know any curanderos who could perform the appropriate elimination sweep, but since that time, even I have to admit that “The Sieghart Luck” has taken a turn for the worst.
My daughter’s eating disorder had suddenly gained a tremendous amount of strength. While still emotionally reeling from having to take her to another treatment facility just the night before, I received a phone call that my son had been knocked unconscious in gym class and appeared to have sustained a pretty significant concussion. We came home from the hospital to find my dishwasher once again refusing to cooperate, my clothes dryer making a screeching noise and a pictureless TV.
My world was out of control and since I don’t have time for a real one, I had a mini-nervous breakdown. This prompted my mother to purchase a lucky eye bracelet from the Home Shopping Network guaranteed to banish the Evil Eye curse that was bestowed upon me.
Oddly, despite my non-belief in lucky amulets, it seemed to work the second I put it on. My daughter is doing quite well in treatment this time around and my son not only recovered from his head injury, his first diving meet of the season proved to be a record breaking one for him. Neither my husband nor I are what anyone would call “handy”, but we actually repaired all of the tag teaming appliances ourselves.
I may have to re-think my position on superstitions. Either way, this bracelet isn’t coming off.
Are you superstitious? What kinds of events or objects do you avoid? Have you ever seen “The Evil Eye”? (I’m still not certain that’s what it was, but it sure wasn’t pretty, I’ll tell you that.) Do you have a lucky charm?
lucky charmis not just a cereal... it's for good luck
