Mwitn Noweki

Manitou Messenger Sept. 13, 1985 Lifestvle/Arts 15

Students Beware: Today may be your unlucky day by Kirsten Foote bring ill-luck. This may ex­ and be forewarned of disasters plain why Larson Hall has to come. twelve, not thirteen floors and Skeptical? Well, you are not why few apartments or hotel alone. There are many people Beware all you superstitious rooms are numbered 13. There who refuse to admit to engaging people! Today is the day that are few tenants who would live in any type of superstitious ac­ walking under ladders, breaking in such an unlucky apartment. tivity at all. But can any of you mirrors and opening umbrellas The beliefs about the ladder, the claim that you did not spend at indoors can be especially bad for mirror and the umbrella also fall least some of your childhood your health. Today is Friday the under this form of superstition. avoiding all of the cracks in the 13th, supposedly the most The second form is the ritual sidewalk in order to avoid break­ unlucky and ominous day of any in which a sequence of events ing you mother's back? And can month. brings about desired effects. . you claim that you never once What makes Friday the 13th You know that favorite jock threw salt over your left such a threatening day for the friend of yours that has baffled shoulder or rubbed a rabbit's superstitous? It is the combina­ you by always tying the left shoe foot or delighted in finding a tion of the unluckiest dav of the before the right and then four leaf clover? The point is week, Friday, and the date coin­ crisscrossing the track in a that everyone is superstitious to ciding. Superstitions surroun­ special pattern before the big some extent. ding the day are so strong that race? This form of superstition To prove this point, I found many businesses actually lose helps to explain why. The same an entire encyclopedia dealing money on Friday the thirteenth; principal applies to that studious with superstition that has over not to mention the fact that friend of yours that gets up at 500 entries and claims to only Hollywood movie makers releas­ the exact same time the morning skim the surface of the incredi­ ed five movies in honor of the before a big test, eats the exact ble array of superstitions in our day. same type of cereal and then sits culture. Superstitions surrounding Fri­ in the exact same desk in the Some of the more common day the thirteenth trace their classroom. types of superstition follow roots back to the day of Christ's The third form of superstition (quotes taking from The En­ but "if you were born on the couple who are going to be mar­ Crucifiction, which occured on a concerns omens and forewarn- cyclopedia of Superstitions): thirteenth then you will be lucky ried, much ill-luck will result." Friday. The number thirteen has ings by which a specific result "If thirteen people meet in a in all your ventures started after Better start revising those guest equally historical beginnings, may be expected, based on a room, one of them will die being brought into the world." lists! tracing its origins back to the predetermined future. That before the year is out. "You up- All those born on this day, take Still skeptical? To be honest, Last Supper in which Christ and howling dog or tolling bell may perclassmen better check the size heart! maybe we should all be. But his twleve disciples—thirteen in be telling you something. The of those upper-level classes keep in mind that unexplainable total—were in attendance. next flash of lightning you see before entering the room. "To see a black cat cross the things are always happening and Superstitions fall into three may be a warning or an omen of "It is unlucky to go courting on road is lucky!" Take that, all that superstitions are one way of categories. The first is prohibi­ things to come. In ancient a Friday." All of you who are you cat haters! trying to explain those mysteries. tion or taboo, in which it is times, people actually used to lucky enough to have dates this "Sneezing of a cat near a So, stay away from the ladders, believed that actions taken will flock to the mountaintops dur­ Friday had better rethink your bride means good luck in her the mirrors and the umbrellas to­ ing thunder storms in order to plans. Of course, ill luck is wedded life." However, "if a day and have a safe and lucky listen to "the voices of the gods" heightened if it fall on a Friday, dog passes between a married Friday! mwitn "fr. nowEKi

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