Talk Like a Pirate

International Talk Like a Pirate Day is September 19

And if ye didn't know that, ye scurvy landlubber, then ye'll be wantin to edumacte yerself, at http://www.talklikeapirate.com/ and perhaps enjoy one of my favorite old sea chanties (those who know me will understand why I like this one) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGyPuey-1Jw

Funny, isn't it, that pirating is one of those fantasies that large numbers of people who otherwise pass for normal have enjoyed living out in SL. It will never be nearly as big as bdsm, of course, but there remain a number of dedicated pirate sims and dedicated pirates. One of the best is Jabberwock, which owes much to the inspiration of a dedicated female pirate, Antigua Jewel.

Like so much else, RL facts can tarnish some of the fun of SL - case in point - nobody wants to be identified with the Somali pirates or anyone like them. In such a "reality - fantasy" split, I prefer to come down firmly on the side of fantasy, and dare anyone to say Errol Flynn or Johnny Depp would be caught dead with GPS or an Uzi!

I did a few searches on women pirates and the plain fact is not many of them came to a happy end. Here is one notable exception, Grace O'Malley, who won the friendship of Queen Elizabeth and a privateer's license and at the height of her swashbuckling career, commanded three ships and 200 men: http://womenshistory.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?zi=1/XJ/Ya&sdn=womenshistory&zu=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.themediadrome.com%2Fcontent%2Farticles%2Fhistory_articles%2Fgrace_omalley.htm As the article says:

...the image of the wild Irish pirate, red haired, and screaming like a banshee from the rigging, is one that every little girl should know. "Put down that Barbie doll, sweetie, I have a story for you…"

I dearly love SL for it's gift of chances to live out some of our wildest dreams, and for me, strangely enough, one of them involved firing a cannon. I believe I was eight, touring a civil war battlefield, when I asked my uncle if I could shoot one of the cannons. He gently pointed out that I might hurt someone if I did. Later, while visiting Fort William Henry, I took home a little cannon as a souvenir, and it still sits on a shelf at home. Once, as a teenager, I almost threw it away, because it was such a tangeable bit of evidence of how hopeless I was. I mean none of the popular girls went around wanting to blow things up (did they?).

Much later I was to find this delightful portrait of a very brave and very famous female gunner in a lively account of the culture and events of the American Revolution, Angel in the Whirlwind by Benson Bobrick:

One of the artillerymen had his wife with him, and she helped him man his gun. This was Mary Ludwig Hayes, who had done equally brave service at Fort Clinton, where, in October, 1777, she had actually fired the last shot before the fortress fell. At Monmouth, according to a fellow soldier, "while in the act of reaching a cartridge and having one of her feet as far from the other as she could step, a cannon shot from the enemy passed directly between her legs, without doing any other damage than carrying away all the lower part of her petticoat. Looking at it with apparent unconcern, she observed that it was lucky it did not pass any higher, for in that case it might have carried away something else, and continued her occupation." After the battle she did legendary service carrying water to the wounded, which earned her the nickname, "Molly Pitcher," by which all such battlefield angels have since been known. p. 330

And so, me hearties, I raises me Shirley Temple and salutes each of you scurvy dogs and wenches on Pirate Day. Here's to each other and to the lovely dreams we share.