I Used To Believe newsletter: February 2009
Hi,
Heritage features in our beliefs this month, whether it's the looks you inherit (literally) from your grandparents or the national pixie in your ancestry.
For more great beliefs visit www.iusedtobelieve.com or get the book of the site, Butter Comes From Butterflies, available from Amazon and all good booksellers!
Have fun,
Mat.
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Remember "I can't believe it's not butter!" ? I used to believe it was a big scam by the CIA to trick people into thinking that this stuff wasn't butter when really, they were just being tricked into eating more butter.
Kristen
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I used to believe to believe that you couldn't drink 7 Up unless you were 7 years or older. Then one day I went to a restaurant and asked for Sprite but the waiter said they had only 7 Up - I freaked out and didn't order it.
Anon
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When I was little my friend Hannah and I were convinced we had amazing superpowers. Hers was seeing the future and mine, slightly less cool, was the power to wake people up. Whenever I'd see my older brother asleep on the couch, I'd stand over him until miraculously he woke up - and freak out that his weird little sister was just staring at him.
Madam Stares-A-Lot
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Red hair tends to skip a generation in my family. When I was little, my parents told me that my gray-haired grandfather had red hair before I was born. Somehow I figured out that the reason old people had gray hair was because they had to give away their color to their grand kids.
Anon
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I was born on St Patrick's day, and one day an old Irish man in the park told me that anyone born on St Patrick's day was part leprechaun. I fully believed it until I was 8.
Karyn
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When I was very young my Grandma told me if you didn't drink freshly squeezed orange juice straight away the vitamins would fly away. I either used to drink my juice straight away or covered my glass to keep the vitamins in. It's wasn't until a couple of years ago, when my partner (yes, I'm 35 now!) asked why I kept putting coasters over our orange juice, that I realised my Grandma may have been "economical" with the truth!
Caroline Richardson-Koehorst
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I used to believe that chipmunks grew up to be squirrels. I don't know where I got the idea from but I lived most of my childhood life believing this!
Anon
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When I was maybe eight, I remember my parents driving through the sleazier part of our town (the bar district), and I saw lots of signs advertising "NO COVER CHARGE FOR LADIES". I thought this meant that if women didn't wear a shirt, they could go in the bar for free.
C.B.
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George Washington was the first president and on the $1 bill so naturally I assumed that since Lincoln was on the $5 bill, he was the fifth president.
Anon
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At daycare when I was 6, the teachers would leave crackers on a picnic table in a big bowl for our snack. Seagulls would fly down, chase us away from the bowl and eat all the crackers. I used to hear my parents talking about Saddam Hussein. He seemed like a "bad guy" and I thought the seagulls were his army, almost like the Wicked Witch of the West and her flying monkeys. I thought that he'd sent them to our daycare steal our snack.
Jane
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I used to believe that horses ate cows and this was why you would never see them in the same field. Not entirely sure where that one came from.
Anon
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Having lived my first 4 years of life in northern Massachusetts, I knew Santa came by sleigh on the snow that was always on the ground at Christmas. When my Dad was stationed in Hawaii, I was terrified that Santa wouldn't come because there was no snow. I looked outside anxiously and saw all the bugs that come out at night in Hawaii. Then I realised that in places where there wasn't snow, the bugs held up Santa's sleigh. I went to bed satisfied that Christmas would come.
Anon
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I used to believe that kids in France were really smart - they already had learned French! It didn't occur to me that they had been taught French from the beginning and had to learn English in school like I learned French. Unfortunately, I was in Jr. High School when I came up with that. I thought everyone spoke English.
Anon
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I used to believe that mushrooms grew from dog pee. We got some wild mushrooms in a bag once and the next morning the bag had a nasty liquid in it but no mushrooms. I never had mushrooms until a few years back.
Tanvi
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When I was about 3 or 4, there was a woman who lived next door to me who had only one leg. She told me that it hurt so she took it off. She had a Boxer, those dogs that have no tails, and I asked her if she took off her tail because it was hurting her too.
Anon
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I learned about building card houses, and I wanted to impress my dad, so I asked if he knew about them. He said, "I *invented* card houses!" and then built one. I took him literally and thought about it all the time. I wondered why he wasn't rich or famous and why we hadn't studied him in school.
Jessica
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I used to think Easter Island was called that because a giant bunny ran around and laid eggs there.
Oliver
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I used to think that you were supposed to wear your seatbelt so that if a policeman pulled over the car and tried to take you out, he wouldn't be able to because you'd be strapped in.
Anon
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When I was young, I used to pick my nose a lot. This was because the Boogie Man lived under my bed and the only way to keep him from kidnapping my blankie was to leave booger offerings on the wall beside my bed.
Annie
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I thought the tapioca bits in tapioca pudding were fish eyes until I was twelve. My mom encouraged this belief so I wouldn't eat her pudding.
Anon
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