Superstition

Today, as I was walking to the Graduate Life Center, the oddest event occurred… a completely black cat crossed my path. As soon as I saw the cat, I immediately started saying, “No, don’t”. Upon me addressing the cat, it paused, looked into my eyes then continued on its way, crossing directly in front of my path. The cat then ran over a large pile of snow to continue on its way causing other students and faculty more bad luck.

I never used to be superstitious, but I have grown to become so. Maybe it’s just coincidence that whenever bad things happen to me, they happen after one of those mysterious instances that everyone deems a “bad luck” situation. Not to say that something bad happens to me whenever one of those instances occur, but bad things tend to only happen after those instances.

I suppose most of my superstition comes from my mom. She always used to tell me the symbolism behind almost everything. She once told me the mole on my right temple meant that I was smart and that it was bad luck to put shoes on a table. I suppose it is part of the culture in the Philippines, but I never asked.

I remember once I was in one of the houses of my mom’s friend and I didn’t know about the whole shoe on the table thing. Needless to say, I was little and put my shoe on the table and was yelled at for like 10 minutes for that. For some reason, bingo is a really big thing with Filipinos and it seems like for them everything is based on luck. I once remember one of my mom’s friends telling me to go outside because I was bad luck and she kept losing bingo. It’s kind of funny growing up in that environment.

In reality, superstition has no real basis. It is completely irrational. I somewhat believe in it because of experience, but it’s like when early civilizations had no explanation for certain events and they would just blame it on some higher being. I hope I make it through the next 17 hours without bad luck… THAT DARN CAT!