#Issue 13

Just a little stitious🐈‍⬛🔮

Are you superstitious? Or just a little stitious?

As I’m sure you’re all aware, today is Friday 13th (there’s another one in December btw). If you suffer from triskaidekaphobia (fear of the number 13), this is issue is probably a nightmare for you.

However, I’m only a little stitious, and therefore don’t have an adverse reaction to the number 13. Quite the opposite actually, being a Taylor Swift fan.

I will, however, salute a lone magpie, avoid stepping on three drains, and try to avoid tempting fate in general. But I have no issue with black cats, will make a point of walking directly under ladders just for fun, and I’ve never broken a mirror but I don’t think it would give me bad luck. Call me contradictory, I guess.

Back to 13 though, where did the superstition come from? Lots of streets will skip the number 13 on houses and many buildings will skip floor 13. On the flip side, staircases have an average of 13 steps. Do you often skip the first/last step? Maybe you don’t even realise why you do it.

There’s many theories as to where the superstition around the number 13 came from; there were 13 people at the Last Supper, Loki is the 13th guest at a dinner party where he tricks someone into murder. There’s also the more modern stories, such as the Friday the 13th franchise which has single-handedly ruined today’s date for people everywhere.

The supposed bad luck of the number 13 is also related to misogyny because, of course. What isn’t at this point?

A lunar cycle takes 28 days, and there are 12-13 lunar cycles a year because of the slight difference in number of days. Every two ish years we get 13 full moons in a single year. Of course, because the moon is so closely associated with femininity in Western cultures, it became bad luck. In other cultures the number 13 is actually considered quite lucky.

It’s also worth noting that 13 is a baker’s dozen.🤷‍♀️

I don’t to tempt the fates by making Issue #13 too long, so I think I’ll leave it here for now. But feel free to drop any weird superstitions you have in the comments!

And that’s that on that🫡

xoxo curiosity curator👀