Patchy Sights

I’ve been thinking about Pirates a lot lately. Not intentionally. They just seem to keep popping into my awareness. And not the the baseball team from Pittsburgh by the way. Although, as baseball goes, they are my favorite team. No. The Pirates I’ve been think of are the Yo-Ho-Ho Pirates. The Arrrrrggghhh Matey Pirates.

I am somewhat miffed by the peg leg thing, the hooky hands, and the eye patches. Perhaps they swam in shark infested waters on a regular basis. Or maybe they were just plain clumsy. Nonetheless, they always seemed to be prosthetically enhanced.

We used to live in Charleston, South Carolina. There are lots of Pirate Stories in that place. It was a big stop-over for the Swashbucklers. Why, just on the street where we lived, there were two accounts.

The first was about a band of Pirates that had been captured, and tried for their freebooting ways. Found guilty, they were sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence was carried out, and they left the bodies hanging there for quite some time as a fair warning to other would-be thieves. The location of the hanging was directly across the street from our house.

The other story was one of treasure. Two doors down was a magnificent home. Albeit, most of the homes south of Broad Street have magnificence of some measure. Anyway. The story goes that Pirates buried a terrific amount of riches in the area of the backyard. Throughout the years, many had searched for the booty. It has never been located. Or at least, no one fessed up to the find.

Speaking of booty, it comes in all sorts for those Pirates. There was a Pirate named Benjamin Hornigold. He once attacked a ship just to steal the hats from all the crew members aboard. You know how Pirates can be. The night before, his men had gotten drunk and lost their hats during a party. It must have been a doozy. Hats off, and all. So Benjamin decided to board a ship to get replacements for his boys.

I have a feeling he was a pretty good Pirate for a couple of reasons. He didn’t harm anyone during the hat heist. And, he cared enough about his crew to find them some brand new toppers.

And there you have it. No matter who we are, or what we have done, we are all capable of noble measures. Actions filled with integrity. Thoughts of compassion, care, and capability. The High C’s.

Pirate Lessons.

And one other item of note.
I wonder if you know how much it costs for a Pirate to get his ears pierced.
Oh. About a Buccaneer.

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“No thief, however skillful, can rob one of knowledge, and that is why knowledge is the best and safest treasure to acquire.”
― L. Frank Baum, The Lost Princess of Oz

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“Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
― Anonymous, Holy Bible: King James Version

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“Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”
― Desmond Tutu

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