Much like Evie and zebo, I honestly can't recall a time when I believed in God. Even though I was required to attend Mass and Sunday school, learned the catechism by rote, and was confirmed, I always felt it was all a bit contrived. If I had to pick a single moment when I knew (rather than strongly suspected) that is was all nonsense, it would be the time when, at about 6 or 7 years old, I dropped my 10p into the collection plate then whispered to my mother, 'Mam, what do they do with all that money?' and she whispered back, 'They give it to God.'
The folk superstitions I grew up with had a much stronger grip on me than did religion: two funerals in the same cemetery on the same day will bring disaster; when someone in the family dies, the youngest child able to do so has to bring the news to the cows and (in season) the bees, or the faeries will give the departed no rest; if you don't give a pleasant hullo to a solitary magpie, you'll have bad cess ('luck') for a year; never pick up a comb you see lying on the ground - it belongs to the banshee; lots more. I can't truthfully say that I'm shut of all of these yet - to this day, I have a sneaking suspicion that putting shoes on a table (any table) is just asking for trouble.
Boru
The folk superstitions I grew up with had a much stronger grip on me than did religion: two funerals in the same cemetery on the same day will bring disaster; when someone in the family dies, the youngest child able to do so has to bring the news to the cows and (in season) the bees, or the faeries will give the departed no rest; if you don't give a pleasant hullo to a solitary magpie, you'll have bad cess ('luck') for a year; never pick up a comb you see lying on the ground - it belongs to the banshee; lots more. I can't truthfully say that I'm shut of all of these yet - to this day, I have a sneaking suspicion that putting shoes on a table (any table) is just asking for trouble.
Boru
‘I can’t be having with this.’ - Esmeralda Weatherwax
