While I was cleaning up the kitchen earlier, I dropped a dish towel on the floor. As I bent to pick it up, I said out loud, "I hope this isn't true." Not that I don't like having people stop by, I just didn't want anybody to come today.
I got to wondering where that old saw comes from, that dropping a dish towel means you're getting company. I looked online to see what I could find, and there was one web site that had hundreds of such sayings and superstitions. There were several about company coming if you drop things, such as, if you drop a knife, a man will come, but a fork means a woman, and a spoon means a child.
There were many, many more, all about spilling salt and spilling milk and rocking chairs with nobody in them and opening umbrellas indoors and getting money if your palm itched, but my favorite was this: It's bad luck to sit on a pair of scissors.
I'm betting that pithy little bit of folklore originated with somebody who found out the hard way.
No comments:
Post a Comment