Ladybugs for rent

I like to write about superstitions. Probably because I’m not very superstitions myself, and so I manage to see the humorous side of most of the ones which so many people take seriously.
Now, there are probably a million superstitions which are recognized by the various cultures around the world, some of them being pretty general: black cats crossing your path, walking under ladders, breaking mirrors, killing spiders, spilling salt, etc. Those, everyone knows and they have been written about in detail. I’m not about to write about them again.
Sometime ago in a previous article, I described some of our local ones: the belief that the devil is getting married behind your door every time that the rain is falling at the same moment that the sun is shining brightly; the ringing of your ears signifying that someone is talking about you; an itch in the palm of your hand meaning that money is about to change hands, etc., and those are the ones that I enjoy: the typically Caribbean ones.
Well, in that article, due to lack of space, I had left a few out (also because I hadn’t thought of them at the time, but that’s between you and me … don’t tell anyone, O.K.? I trust you, now). So here are a few which have just come to mind. You may recognize a couple or more of them, and some may be more international than I know; but since they were all learnt at my mother’s knee, so to speak, I associate them with St. Lucia. If they are typically St. Lucian – or Caribbean – then, very well, they fit into this article. If they are not, well, so what? They’re fun to know anyway.
Like the one about not washing hands together. I remember, when I was a child, pushing my hands under a running water tap in the kitchen sink, while one of my cousins was in the process of washing his hands, “You mustn’t do that, you know,” I was quickly admonished and corrected, “if you wash your hands together, you’ll surely have a fight with each other.” I don’t know whether it was the power of suggestion, or whatever, but nine times out of ten, the saying proved true. I still believe that we pushed and shoved each other, because we knew that we were supposed to push and shove each other. Anyway, chalk one up for the superstition theory: that one came true, more often than not.

This next one is not quite a superstition; it can probably be classified as a belief; or it may even be just a joke: how many times have you seen someone take a seat just vacated by someone else and go, “Boy, this seat is hot. You’re just full of sins, aren’t you?” It probably stems from the religious belief that if you pass from this world in a sinful state, you are relegated to that region in the other world where the climatic conditions may be perpetually expressed as “extra high temperatures, with blazing flames to keep your derriere well charred. The air conditioning units will all be out of order again today.”
So in anticipation of your going there, your rear end is actually already warming up, if you presently have a trailer-load of sins carrying around. And that’s why the chair which you were sitting on is so hot.
Here’s another superstition. It may have some basis in medical fact, I don’t know: did you know that if you pick a baby or a young child up by one arm, he/she is liable to become deaf in the ear on the side opposite to that arm? I have this huge, husky friend who is a father, and just loves to play “rough game” with his kids. I’ve found it amusing to see him pick up one of his young ones by the right arm, for example, and hear his mother (the kid’s, not the husky father’s mother) cry, “watch it, watch out for that left ear!” convinced that something damaging would ensue. She may be right. I’m not taking any chances by lifting anyone’s kids by one arm. I still haven’t worked out what would happen if one lifted the child by both arms, though.
We also believe that green grasshoppers coming into your house means good news is on the way: the brown ones have no news at all (maybe it’s a case of: “no news is good news”?), so they probably should both be made welcome. A cricket, on the other hand, means that rain is due to fall, as does the presence of flying cockroaches. I have a feeling that these are not all strictly superstitions. There may be some instinct angle to the whole thing which I don’t fully understand. I have this friend who jokingly insists that this connection between crickets and rain may be one of the reasons why it rains so often during the cricket season. Sure, sure, blame it all on the poor insects, even the weather.
Hey, why not? Makes a change from blaming it all (even the bad weather) on the government – no matter which political party is in power.
And while in the insect world, my mother always believed that if a ladybug alighted on your person, it meant that some money was forthcoming. She may have been right: there isn’t much money around these days; there don’t seem to be any ladybugs either.
As a matter of fact, things are so bad, that maybe we should be looking to import an entire container of the cute little beggars.
Personally, I’m going out into the bush, as soon as I put this pen down, and going on a ladybug hunt.
It’s better than just sitting around, waiting for things to happen. If I find any, I may start a business, renting them out.
Book yours early, to avoid the rush, and the long lines.
You could do with a bit of ready cash, couldn’t you?