Traditions play a big role for life in The South. And New Year Day is no different.

Or are those traditions just superstitions?

Did you clutch money in your hand at midnight Tuesday as 2013 officially changed into 2014? Do you eat black-eyed peas and greens every Jan. 1? Do you avoid washing clothes that day?

Clinging to money on New Year’s Eve goes back to the belief that whatever you are doing at the start of the year, you will be doing all year. In that case, it means a prosperous year. The concept of black-eyed peas and greens are also based in money. The pea part actually is a Jewish custom that dates back to the Old Testament. It came to Georgia in 1730 with an influx of immigrants. The greens part is much newer. The color of the vegetable is likened to color of paper money.

We decided to throw a little twist into our Jan. 1 lunch menu. We eschewed the ham hocks and cornbread. We kept the peas but switched out the greens for roasted cabbage steaks. It was a brand new recipe and turned out wonderful. And it didn’t stink up the house, like cabbage often does. We might have a new tradition. Next time, might have to use a little chili oil instead of garlic olive oil.

Worth the wait

Sometimes, the wait is part of the process to make the end result better. Like the adage says, the older the grape, the sweeter the wine.

For me, it is the same with movies. There are certain milestone movies that need to be seen for the first time in their original, full-length, unedited form. Over the years, I have intentionally avoid watching some movies on television, not wanting to see it with any naughty, spicy or blue scenes lopped off and left on the editing room floor.

The first time the subject came up was the epic movie Lawrence of Arabia. If you didn’t see Peter O’Toole riding across the sand in a theater in 1962, you were out of luck for the next quarter century.  While other movies were released on video tape, Lawrence never was. I remember hearing people say that was a movie that HAD to be seen in a theater on the big screen; no television could do it justice. (Of course a modern 60-inch HDTV probably could.)

Then in 1989, I got my shot. The movie was restored and sent out in a limited release. At the time, I was a jeweler in Tupelo, Miss. The closest theater showing the 3.5-hour film was in Memphis, about 100 miles away. I took a day off, drove to Memphis and sat in a darkened theater with a Coke and a box of buttered popcorn. It was worth it.

It was the same way with The Godfather. There was no way you would want to see any of them on television. And even after the movies came out on video tape and later on DVD, I intentionally stayed away from them. I was holding out. I didn’t figure the trilogy would ever make it back to the big screen. When Kathy bought a boxed set of the three movies, we just had to figure out when.

Our quiet and laid back Christmas turned out to be the perfect time. Three days. Three movies. Monday night we saw hot-headed Sonny Corleone walk into an ambush and his younger brother Michael being swept into the family business. Christmas Eve included flashbacks and a really young Robert DeNiro as Vito as he earned the title of Godfather. Night Three flashed forward to a much older Michael as he tried his best to turn the family business into a legitimate one. It didn’t work out as planned.

William Moore is the Senior Editor at Gulf Coast Newspapers. He can be reached at wmoore@gulfcoastnewspapers.com