Superstitions

By Johnny D. Boggs

I just made an emergency run to the grocery.

I was out of blueberries. Had gone days without any. Which explained why this week has been so lousy. 

Sources for magazine assignments blowing me off. Outlining a novel not coming together as I’d hoped. Sentence I just wrote reading like crud.

Here’s my morning ritual: Get up. Let the doggies out and feed the big one. Hit the coffeemaker. Shower. Get dressed. And, most importantly, make myself a smoothie.

The ingredients vary, depending on what’s available. Raspberries. Strawberries. Blackberries. Spinach. Celery. Tomatoes. Oranges. Peach. Grapefruit. Lemon. Chile. Carrots. Apple. Cucumber. Zucchini. Brazil nuts. Protein powder.

And 20 blueberries.

For good luck.

I am not so insecure and insane that I must have a 20-blueberry smoothie when I’m on the road. When I’m home, however, I remain fairly certain that failure to include those 20 blueberries dooms me to a frustrating day at the Mac. That the Kansas City Royals and South Carolina Gamecocks will stink if they’re playing. That the check I’m expecting won’t be in the mail. 

If I happen to have only 23 blueberries left, I’ll likely add the extra three. Maybe.

A 20-blueberry smoothie could be a ritual because I happen to like blueberries, though, as a native of South Carolina, I’m a much bigger fan of peaches. Maybe the specific number is just a tradition. Perhaps it’s comforting.

Or I could be superstitious.

But I have no problem stepping on cracks in sidewalks. I don’t worry if a black cat walks in front of me. Thirteen is just another number. There’s no rabbit’s foot around. I won’t walk under a ladder, but that’s because my dad was a building contractor, and there might be someone on that ladder, or there might be a hammer or a gallon of paint atop the ladder, and I don’t want a carpenter or a hammer falling on my head or being bathed in paint if I accidentally slip and hit that ladder.

When I coached Little League, I would try to wear the same socks, shoes, etc., if we were winning. Once we lost, the mojo was gone and I’d find new duds or wash the luck back into what I had been wearing. I would chastise anyone who started packing up equipment before the game was over.

And I will never step on a foul line.

Superstitions apply to writing, too.

The first book I ever sold was mailed (back when we actually mailed typed manuscripts), per the publisher’s guidelines, in 12-point Monaco. Most people that I run into these days have never even heard of Monaco, but I use it all the time. Well, if a publisher demands 10-point Times New Roman or 14-point Calibri, I’ll try to comply. If I happen to forget, I just think, Hey, Editors, all y’all have to do is hit “Select All,” and change the font and point size, silly.

Then when the editors have a bad day, they have only themselves to blame.