Luck

14 February 2022

It came to me last Thursday as I was slaving my legs to pedal me to work that all the crickets are gone because of human intervention. They must have sprayed an insecticide. It saddens me that the sweet trill of birds I cannot name are no longer accompanied by the male cricket's mating call. They must be unaware that crickets are thought to bring good luck.

And I read today that it was devastating for one's luck to kill a cricket —— definitely a crisis to commit cricket genocide. As I was looking at more luck symbols related to my further reading of the Tumi ceremonial knife borne of my Inca empire preoccupation, I saw that the blue bird in Kayangan was a swallow. It was supposed to be lucky.

We ascribe them to animals or their body parts/implements (the horseshoe, rabbit's paw, monkey's hand, elephant, pig) natural or manufactured (dala horses, three-legged/golden toads, three-legged pigs, waving cats) or designated mythical (komainu, fu dogs, pi yao, pi xiu, kiritmukha).

All those symbols of luck. We ascribe objects with meaning to remind us and make us believe things would go our way. Felix felicis.