Are “Old Wives Tales” irrational or prophetic?
The old wives tales sometimes had great meaning and were not superstitious at all… My grandma forbid me from sweeping at night….she said it was an old wives tale…but I asked a doctor…he said…when the dew comes up in the evening and you sweep…with the windows opened like in the early days of this nation…the dust would stay in the air and cause croup. Another one was when you move into a house you bring a loaf of bread in first and a broom…another reasonable one because you must clean up before you move in and then you get hungry. grandma had thousands of them…..she would quote me a poem when I would whistle while I worked….. A whistling girl and a crowing hen always come to some bad end.
