Born in a superstitious country of the Far East, spirits abound, beliefs given down by generations.  Origins of these beliefs are sometimes gripped by fear because our elders believed them and practiced them, so we too, continued to believe them whole-heartedly.   Some beliefs held true and some just don’t make any sense.

But throughout my life, I have always sat on the fence.  Believed in it when it suited me and discarded when it was too alarming to consider.  For instance, the belief when you shatter a mirror, bad luck reigns for the next 7 years. In Roman times they believed that the human body renewed itself every seven years, so when a mirror is shattered, it shatters the health of the person who broke it.  Now this belief was passed down from my mother, grandmother, aunts and uncles, so it certainly jolted me when I broke the handheld mirror the children gave me for my birthday as I unwrapped the present.  I shrugged.  My life was good, I was healthy, everything I had was borne out of love and care so this superstition is all but unfounded. I can now recall how unstable my life was for a period of 7 to 8 years thereon. On the face of it, we had a wonderful marriage, three wonderful children but our financial world was collapsing on us, which led to be a devastating blow to my relationship with my siblings, which has never healed.

This story is not about my vicissitude of life.  It is about discovering a superstition that gripped me with fear when my baby was born.  It is an ancient oriental belief that was handed down, and I believed this old superstition. I was hoping that this was not going to unfold like the shattered mirror.

He was my third child (fifth pregnancy) and was scribbled on the Doctor’s chart as “elderly gravida”.  Elderly was the provocative word, knowing full well I was 36, eggs depleting and having a higher chance of the baby being genetically abnormal or in more frightening words to any mother’s ear, were the words “Downs syndrome”.  Pregnancy went fine, amniocentesis test was normal at 16 weeks and I sat back and had the most wonderful pregnancy ever.  I was beautiful, glowing and such calmness totally took over even though chaos was around taking care of two children under 9 years old.

Baby boy was beautiful.  Lustful cry – all digits present and all fears disappeared.  Fast forward, a few years later  - we are back in my home town where Jasmine-scented flowers filled the air, maids sashaying in their sarongs offering iced coconut juice, remedying the sweaty, hot and heavy humid air when my dear amateur palmist friend mentioned baby’s palm had the simian crease.  Red flags everywhere was in my mind. I was advised by my aunties, in another time, having passed away many many moons ago, never marry a man where the heart line and head line merge into one (a simian crease) which meant that this person can kill.  Don’t cross him or anger anyone with that crease.  He takes his anger to the limit.  These were elderly aunties, full of wisdom, had lived a long time, and was respected by all….who was I not to bow my head and respect their sagacity.

Now I am faced with my child having this affliction, aunties no longer here to soothe my angst or explain their knowledge. It was not a disease, nor an impediment of some kind.  It was just an old wives tale, formulating into paranoia.  Do I go to a psychiatrist, or do I go to my pediatrician and explain my predicament – no science man was going to listen to me.  Or so I thought.

Very sensitive, empathetic, gentle and yet very intense loving boy he turned out to be. I had put this intensity as troubled teen years.  His forcefulness of his feelings usually made our relationship a little strained and I was aware that I should not push him over the limit.  Secretly I remembered those warnings from my aunties. When I, reproached him for not achieving his goals, there were two reactions.  Either the intenseness of making amends, with such fervor, that I believed whole-heartedly that the change would be miraculous. Or such fierce anger, banging his fists and challenges me with words that I would shrink from his gaze.

In the world of hand analysis, the simian crease, a straight line of the head and heart line merging as one is called “gift markings”. I discovered through countless articles written on this subject means that the person has extra potential talent.  A soft way of saying this was indeed a special child, my cynicism emerging. The lines combine the thinking and the feeling together.  So if you ask this person, how does he feel, he would say, “I think I feel fine”.  This is because his thinking and feeling is one of the same.

To understand this better, imagine that a Simian crease owner has an extra seventh sensory perception, and let’s call it a communication device or a (black box).  All words and tones of voice get filtered in and out. So an intense feeling through this black box can get heard as anger or frustration. For instance my son could be saying, “I’m thinking of going to a full-moon party”  (with all its bad connotation) what I understood was “I’m going to the party and there’s no more discussion on that topic.”  And I would be left with more total anxiety, worry over the implications of what full moon parties were about.

Simian creases are not common. Only 20% of the population are afflicted and only 10% with both palms. They perceive life as either black or white – no shades in between.  Because they think and feel at the same time, they cannot tolerate bullshit from others.  My son actually suffers from friends telling him of their dilemma, he feels their pain and when he discovers what they say and what is real do not match, he then cannot tolerate this and consider them liars. To him the pain is there or it isn’t; thinking and feeling for him is one of the same.  Because of his inability to separate the two, he just won’t tolerate any kind of bullshit.  It took me a long time to understand and found solace in the knowledge that it is better to feel deeply than not to feel at all.

As he is able to deal with his feelings today, apprehension as a parent diminishes.  Coming across diversity helps him to forge on with intensity, and a few mistakes with dire consequences along the way strengthens his weaknesses.  He has found that there is one person who truly understands his psych and for the time being, this is enough. When intensity gets too much, he has learned to hold back, checks himself and tries to counteract the feelings.  Sometimes counteracting goes too far the other way.  Black is still always black, white is white, for him there is no grey.

I take heed for all old wives tales, folk lore, traditions –  they are there for a reason. My aunties although no longer around, but their persuasive thoughts and ideas are very much valid.  I thank them for their little tidbits that they passed along the way. In our world of the internet, science and reasoning, there is still room for myths, folklore, and spiritual answers where ipads, apple macs, and blackberries don’t belong.