Pinch, Punch, First of the Month.

The Rhyme: ‘Pinch, punch, first of the month.’ We said it as children; our children said it. This morning grandson-Luca messaged me with the greeting. I asked Mr Google about its origin.

Some think that it came from the fear of witches in medieval times. On the first of each month a ritual pinch of salt was believed to weaken witches; a literal punch was to banish them for good.

An alternative American theory is that George Washington met local Indian tribes on the first of each month with a gift of fruit punch with a pinch of salt added.

The British theory is about destroying the bad; the American is about promoting the good. Perhaps we have our personal evil, unwelcome ‘witches’ to destroy or good ‘Indians’ to build peaceful, positive relationships with…

The song, made famous by Bing Crosby:

You’ve got to accentuate the positive
Eliminate the negative
And latch on to the affirmative
Don’t mess with Mister In-Between

Destroying the bad, at the same time as building up the good, is such an important life-lesson and practice for all of us…

To illustrate my last remark
Jonah in the whale, Noah in the ark
What did they do just when everything looked so dark?

The lyric continues: ‘They said we better, accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative…

The story: Yesterday I read the story of Jonah… God tells Jonah to go to Nineveh… he sails away in the opposite direction… the storm comes, he’s thrown overboard, swallowed by a great fish… he prays to God from inside the fish… he’s given a second chance and goes to Nineveh…

Later, a few of us talked about the story, about God giving us second chances – sometimes after going through tough times. A second chance to live out the song – accentuating the positive, eliminating the negative… to put the rhyme into action. Today, the start of a new month, is another personal opportunity… to get rid of our ‘witches’ and build positive relationships with our ‘Indians’.