What’re the chances?
It doesn’t take but a speck of red to turn bright white paint rosy. You discover that pretty quickly when you set about to learn to paint—pink, the girly color. It’s light red. So specific. There are names for light blue—baby blue, light brown—tan, light black—grey, but there’s nothing like pink to embrace the territory of the feminine. It’s like no other color. You think pink and you think girl.
It didn’t register when I picked up the pink pirate out of the chaos of beach debris but it did go in the pocket of the hiking vest where I stash special things, lighters, hair clips, bottle caps with Asian writing, toy soldiers. It wasn’t 'til I got to doing a high rez picture of the little guy that I thought ….pink pirate? Where would he fit in some kid’s fantasy play life? Pink Pirate….
Maybe when they were mixing up a batch of white some red got in? Maybe he got bleached? The high rez image shows he’d been chewed on and spit out, the tooth gashes show he’s pink all they way through. Not bleached. The World Wide Web may have a clue, anyway its fun to be sleuthing about.
Five minutes of www. And I find Classic Toy Soldiers "No batteries required . . . powered by imagination." A company not too far from Kansas City, MO but in Kansas. CTS as they call themselves. Yes, they had my little guy for sale in a pirate kit with five figures and accessories (cutlasses, a jolly roger, a treasure chest…) colors vary, vintage MPC (Multiple Plastic Corporation no longer in business) $23.00. The set shown is brown, black and red. Very not pink. Google to “Pink Pirate” and I get Pink Pirate Sword, $12.99 from Kohl’s which must be an accessory to the “Pink Pirate Dancer Adult Plus Size” $49.99.
I talk to my daughter Amelia to get her thoughts. Pink Pirate? “Well, it’s both good and bad. Soft risky. Do you remember my six-year-old Halloween costume?” “What do you want to be this year?” “A bat”—her little hands up as claws, “rrrrrrrrawwwwww! I want to be a bat, a pink bat.” We made her the pink bat costume. What are the chances? But two days later I find a pink bat at Kehoe Beach.
--Richard
