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“We’ll take a cup o’ kindness yet, for auld lang syne.” — Robert Burns, “Auld Lang Syne”
That 1700s Scots poem set to familiar music is often used to mark the end of something. In our culture, usually another year “for (the sake of) old times.”
“Auld Lang Syne” became a U.S. tradition after Canadian bandleader Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians orchestra played it on New Year’s Eve in 1929 during a radio broadcast at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York City.
But a few years before that, on New Year’s Day in 1920, my father’s parents began what would become 47 years of marriage. S.V. Aldridge took as his bride Hattie Lois Farmer. She became the family wise woman of philosophy and old sayings for the new year and all occasions.
Prognostication regarding luck and life was almost an art form for my grandmother, and something for which I suspect she relied on a tad of tradition and a smidge of superstition.
She was born in Aledoin 1905 and was 15 when she married. He was born in Natchez, Mississippi, in 1888 and was 31 when he said, “I do.” By then, he had worked for the railroad since the age of 13 and recently served with the Army in France during World War I.
Ten years later, my father was 7 years old when they moved to Pittsburg in Northeast Texas, where my grandparents lived in the same house for the rest of their lives. For him, that was until 1967; for her, 1993.
Life was different 100 years ago. Their age difference was not that uncommon then. And their education, for the most part, came more from experience than from schoolbooks.
As each year drew to a close, she shared her philosophies to inform everyone in the family about what was in store for the new year, according to Hattie Aldridge.
Many of Granny’s philosophies about explaining and coping with life were likely based partly on life, partly on superstition and a lot on the Lord. She was a devout member of the First Methodist Church in Pittsburg for more than 60 years.
Her pivotal piece of providence was eating for prosperity. New Year’s dinner included black-eyed peas, cabbage and delicacies dedicated to ensuring good luck and financial fortune. Truthfully, I was a fan of peas and cabbage any day at her house if they came with cornbread and iced tea.
Weather forecasts were also part of her New Year’s admonitions.
On her Cardui calendar, she noted the weather every day for the first 12 days. These notes became her forecasting tool for each of the next 12 months. If New Year’s Day was stormy, cloudy or cold, then bad weather was in store for the first month of the new year. Rain on the third meant March would be wet.
It seemed a really fascinating substitute for science until the year snow fell on the eighth. And, no — it did not snow in August that year.
She also swore that the first person entering your home on Jan. 1 would strongly influence your life in the new year. And it was especially good fortune if that first visitor was bearing a gift or something good to eat.
Well, yes! I’ve always thought that any day someone came to my house with gifts or food was a good day.
Granny never did laundry on New Year’s Day. No how, no way. Dirty clothes would wait until Jan. 2. But she also held that it was bad luck to labor with laundry on any Monday. She died having never owned a washing machine.
“Doing the laundry” for her meant a couple of No. 3 wash tubs, a scrub board and a clothesline.
In my book, that would constitute lousy luck whatever day I dealt with dirty clothes.
Looking back, our good fortune today is that, in many ways, life is immensely better than it was then.
Or, as my good friend Oscar used to say, “These are the good old days.”
With your New Year’s traditions, I wish you a happy and prosperous 2025. Enjoy your blackeyed peas and cabbage, check the weather, and may that first visitor bring you good cheer and a small gift... and do your laundry.
And “for (the sake of) old times,” I also wish for all of us that our good fortune in the new year lasts longer than our resolutions.
Contact Aldridge at [email protected]. Other Aldridge columns are archived at leonaldridge. com.
