If my recent life had been ideal, the date Dec. 4, 2007 would resonate in my mind as well as Dec. 2, 2003 and July 7, 2006 do.
Unfortunately, even the most poetic moments in life don’t always rhyme perfectly. So we live with the imperfection it often brings.
For this is the story of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies and my life. And how they danced with one another in a macabre waltz that only I could enjoy. Or at least marvel at.
Dec. 2, 2003. A day that will live in infamy. I was in Key West for the annual Pirates in Paradise Festival. Julie, the festival director, had wangled the Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl DVD release event there. Part of the festivities was an appearance by our crewe at the local Blockbuster. It was there that the first tumbler would click into place in a combination of events that would eventually bring me to where I am today – sunny Florida. A reporter was there interviewing the pirates for a story on the release. And I was sent over by Julie to do an interview. As always, I was a flirtatious rogue with the reporter. She would be the central character in the sequel, Dead Man’s Chest.
July 7, 2006. I should have known I was a Dead Man during the weekend of the theatrical release of the Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. I was now marrying the reporter, at the Pirates Dinner Adventure Theatre no less. I had written a script that fit perfectly into their show and I recited every line perfectly, as if in a movie. And it felt like one too. There was the reporter’s large Chest, And I was going to be a Dead Man. A fitting start to what was going to prove to be a rocky voyage in matrimony.
Now, if the poetry of life were to have a perfect rhyme here, Dec. 4, 2007 should have heralded the end of the marriage. For it is on this date that Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End was released on DVD. If a marriage is going to end, isn’t your world suppose to end as well? As I said, poetry… DENIED!
Instead, there was no movie release when it all ended last June. No one attended. No one applauded. Pyrates of the Coast: The Melbourne Years — had closed, for good. A poetic ending, without the perfect rhyme of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy parallel.
And now I hear that Pirates of the Caribbean: Stranger Tides has begun production. It has a very appropriate title again, now that I’ve begun my own sequel in life, one of many over the last 52 (egad, has it been that long?) years.
And they say that movies don’t parallel real life. 🙂
Til next time,
— Robb