There were many superstitions for us growing up (all numbered, as per tradition in our small community) ranging from those viewed as trivial (like the 17th Superstition: if you spill your milk, then you must throw salt over your left shoulder to avoid a plague of minor annoyances for the next week or so) to those viewed as cataclysmic (like the 34th Superstition: if you don’t leave an offering of bread and honey for the household spirits every morning, then they will wreak actual havoc on the lives of the household, instead of giving their usual assistance).

The 1st Superstition, however, was sacrosanct. There were laws on the books concerning it, in our town. We weren’t even allowed to name it in voices above a hushed whisper, or risk a ticket and a hefty fine if a cop heard you. Three tickets landed a person in jail or juvie for six months, so this was not taken lightly.

My little sister hated it. All of it. She was seventeen at the time, and was oh so very modern and skeptical. She didn’t believe in any of that “old fashioned nonsense,” and really believed that all of the problems in her life that caused her so much grief amounted to a simple string of random occurrences, rather than her own refusal to participate in “those stupid traditions.”

Sure, she avoided mentioning the 1st Superstition, like everyone did, because she didn’t want to get a ticket or a lecture from our parents (and removal of privileges like her phone), but she absolutely would not throw the salt if she spilled the milk, and she certainly wasn’t leaving any offerings for the “imaginary” household spirits.

My little sister was a walking disaster, and the effects of her actions rebounded on all those around her (the 34th Superstition affected whole households, after all, and there were plenty of others that affected friends, neighborhoods, or extended family as well). Neighbors constantly complained, and my sister was regularly in trouble with her school. My sister felt the worst of the effects, of course, as her actions were the cause.

Every boyfriend she ever had cheated on her, and every meal she tried to make came out inedible. She perpetually walked around with a sprained this or a pulled that. Literally nothing went her way. We all knew why, but she couldn’t acknowledge the reality that everyone else could plainly see.

Finally, after breaking her right leg and left arm while riding a bicycle (slowly, during daylight hours, and along a level, unpeopled, and smoothly paved bike trail), our parents got her an appointment at the local mental health clinic for an evaluation. I was relieved, and believed an end to this insanity she had fixated on would soon arrive. I was also annoyed that our parents had delayed taking action for so long.

It was understandable, though. What parent wants to believe that their daughter’s mental state would not return to a more healthy place on its own, once it had drifted so far outside the norm? For three years they had believed it was just a passing rebellious phase, and that she would eventually grow out of it. But she never did, and the consequences compounded over time, so in the end, they made the call.

I insisted that I would go along for the ride to make sure my sister didn’t convince our mother that this was all blown way out of proportion, and to take her back home instead. When the day arrived, my sister hobbled into the waiting room at the clinic huffing and puffing and complaining nonstop about the stupidity of bringing her there in the first place. There was nothing whatsoever wrong with her, she insisted, aside from having a backwards family and living in a backwards town. The leg and arm were due to her own inherent clumsiness, and nothing more.

Unsurprisingly, the psychologist at the clinic diagnosed her with a disorder that is unique to our town, and maybe a dozen or so others throughout the world: Delusional Denial of Superstition, or DDS. The symptoms were easy to spot, even by the average layperson, and my parents had arrived at a point where if they hadn’t taken action, the school was threatening to call child welfare services on them for the medical neglect of a minor, and the police for serious violations of public safety laws. We were not well loved in our neighborhood, and I had hoped that my parent’s decision to finally seek evaluation and treatment for my sister would allow us, as a family, to reintegrate into the daily social fabric of our community.

People with symptoms of DDS were, again, easy to spot. They had a history of denying the copious evidence that supports the reality of superstitions in this, and a small number of other known towns, scattered across the globe (each with their own unique, though related, numbered systems of superstitions), and their lives and the lives of those around them were therefore in utter disarray from their own refusal to abide by the superstitions of the respective towns in which they lived.

The fact that so few towns have such demonstrably real superstitions means that the outside world ignorantly reinforces the delusion at every turn, and DDS sufferers place great value on the views of the outside world. The internet brought with it near epidemic levels of DDS, and extreme measures had to be taken to protect the citizenry in towns like ours (which had become full-blown disaster areas within a frighteningly short period of time) including confinement in special DDS wards.

My sister was too young to remember the crisis, but I did. It had been terrifying to live through as a 10 year old child, but my sister, the product of an unexpected yet welcomed pregnancy, was born right in the middle of it all.

This was the world in which we lived, and this was the disorder that had snatched up my little sister. If only she had been seen at an earlier stage, things may have turned out very differently, but such is life and what’s done is done.

When she heard the psychologist say that she had a severe case of DDS, my sister got so angry that she screamed, bolted to her feet, and hobbled outside just as fast as her crutches would allow. Our mother and I trailed behind cautiously, while the psychologist clutched at her chest and exclaimed “well, I never!”

My sister hobbled rapidly across the parking lot, and then proceeded to weave her way through the slow moving traffic to cross the street, towards the grassy and tree-strewn town square, with its adjoining park, botanical gardens, and aviary. I was sure that she was heading to her favorite spot, a little nook with a bench in some shade between the botanical gardens and the aviary. It was where she always went to calm down when she was upset, so my mother and I weren’t concerned to see her heading in that direction. It’s what we both expected the moment she stood and hobbled out of the clinic.

As my sister made her way through the town square, however, she didn’t turn left on the path towards her spot when she reached it. She continued right past the fountains, and directly towards the very center of the town square. At this point my mother dropped her purse and began to run after my sister like the devil himself was chasing her. She must have realized what my sister was about to do, though the thought hadn’t even occured to me because it was, frankly, unthinkable.

Only as my sister dropped her crutches and awkwardly began to climb the thirteen steps of the monument where the town bell hung, did it finally register. I realized there was no time to stop her, and watched in horror as my little sister neared the top of the steps.

The town bell had only ever been wrung once, at the celebration of the founding of our town some 250 years before, and it was never to be wrung again, by superstition backed by law.

At the top my little sister paused, then turned to look at our now frantic mother who had tripped on a picnic basket and was screaming “nooooo!” as she scrambled back to her feet, then she spun back around on her one good foot, grabbed the raggedy old rope hanging from the center of the bell, and with a wild shriek, she rang it. She rang it relentlessly, with all her might, over and over and over again, as she screamed in rage and pent up frustration, until she finally went limp and collapsed.

At the precise moment that she let go of the rope, every building in the entire town shattered. Every road shuddered until it completely broke apart. Cars exploded into flames and bridges disintegrated into rubble.

The screams were maddening. I can still hear them in the back of my mind. They never stop. The scene became an instant hellscape. The entire town was engulfed in smoke and flames and flying debris. It all lasted for around three minutes. At the end of it all, the only people left alive were those who weren’t in, on, or near any large man-made structures. The monument itself was the only large man-made structure to remain, and it was left perfectly untouched.

In such a small space of time, the entire town was destroyed, along with my sister and mother, whom I had to helplessly watch die. I myself narrowly survived, having hidden between some boulders in the square once I realized what she was about to do. I sustained serious injuries, however, that have left me paralyzed from the waist down and missing an arm. My town, my loved ones, and almost everyone I had ever known were suddenly gone. They were all destroyed the day my little sister violated the 1st Superstition.

9/17/25