A Different View with Dave O’Connell

Even the phrase itself belongs to a different era, but half of us are still in thrall to Old Wives’ Tales, those colloquial expressions from the distant past, often used to dissuade children from nefarious activities as much as anything else.

But they have left us with a lifelong habit of touching wood to avoid misfortune and firmly believing that breaking a mirror will bring us seven years of bad luck – back luck that any amount of wood-touching won’t undo.

We will walk out in front of speeding traffic to avoid going under a ladder on the footpath, and some are convinced that an itchy palm means money is on the way rather than the more likely indication that you’re in need of a good, long shower.

You feed a cold to starve a fever – a sort of superstitious take on the notion of a vaccine that delivers a little of a virus to builds up the body’s resistance to the real thing.

There are others; never open an umbrella indoors because it is a precursor to bad luck; sitting too close to the telly will make you go blind; death – and bad luck – comes in threes; you should never swim immediately after eating.

It’s bad luck to spill salt – but if you do, you can neutralise the luck by sprinkling some over your left shoulder.

Magpies should only be seen in pairs, but if you see one on its own, you can bless yourself to undo potential damage.

Cracking your knuckles will leave you with arthritis in your knuckles.

Don’t make strange faces or the wind will change and leave you that way for good.

And there’s a dozen of them when it comes to childbirth – like if the baby’s heartbeat is under 140 beats per minute, you’re having a boy; if the mammy is carrying low, it’s also a boy, but high, it’s a girl. Extra weight out front means a girl; weight around the hips and bottom indicates a boy.

In each of those cases, you’ve a 50/50 chance of being right.

The phrase ‘old wives’ tale’ is also from a different era but it turns out that this is only an interpretation of the translation, dating back to Old English when the word for a woman was ‘wif’. So it’s a superstition handed on by a woman, rather than necessarily a wife.