Creativenonfiction#42 - Are Some Objects Really Powerful Or ...
There is a saying that "The longer you look at an object, the more abstract it becomes and ironically, the more real - Lucian Freud".
I have always been wary of some things I have been told while growing up because I find them absurd but sometimes I do wonder if it's real or not.
I have been told of the powers of a safety pin as it is seen as an object that protects pregnancy against demons/witchcraft. I had always wondered how an object as small as that could act as a shield to ward off bad things for a pregnant woman.
Well, I don't believe in things like that as I would ask questions about what will happen should a pregnant woman fail to attach a safety pin to her clothes. I get responses like the child inside her could be replaced with a troublesome one, she could lose her pregnancy or even her life, etc. Sometimes I would ask those women why use just one? the pregnant women should as well wear safety pins all over from head to toe so that there won't be a space where the "witches" could penetrate and I am always rewarded with a stern look.
An incident happened some time ago which got me thinking maybe, just maybe they are right about the whole safety pin thing for a pregnant woman. It happened that two of my neighbors got pregnant, I don't know if it's the same time because I was much younger then. I would just call them Woman A and Woman B. When their pregnancies became visible, I do hear on occasion where people around tell them to always attach a safety pin on any clothes they wear to ward off any evil that might affect their pregnancy. Woman A did attach the pin while Woman B said she doesn't believe in such things as the safety of her and her baby isn't tied to "objects". She was pressured to use the safety pin but she didn't give in.
When it was then when it was time to deliver though not at the same time, woman A who always attach pins had her baby first while woman B as you guessed had complications with her pregnancy and her baby was stillborn. I felt bad for her even though I was young and didn't know the right words to say to console her but the worst thing was how some of the women around said behind her back that she brought it upon herself as she could have prevented what happened to her.
I couldn't believe people could be that mean, trying to prove themselves right while a woman is going through pain. On the other hand, what they said made me start having second thoughts and I asked myself " Is this object that powerful? Could it have prevented what happened to this woman?" But now that I know better, I knew what happened to her wasn't a result of her failure to attach the safety pin to her clothes. I know some people find some objects "sacred", I am not against their beliefs in any way as everyone is entitled to what they believe but what I don't like is when people get guilt-tripped into thinking they were the cause of what happened to them because they didn't "believe" in myths.
Thank you all for reading.