It Was a Dark and Stormy Night - For Real!

As a kid I went through a phase, as most boys did, when I wanted to learn about pirates.  Yes, they were rogues and scoundrels, and often downright nasty villians, but there were old black-and-white movies starring Errol Flynn and other swashbuckling actors that made some of the pirates likable.
I remember a Disney movie called "Blackbeard's Ghost," starring (I believe) Peter Ustinov as a somewhat bumbling ghost of Captain Blackbeard.  Before the movie came out (yeah, I'm that old), I found a book in the school library entitled "Blackbeard's Ghost," and I checked it out to find out more about Blackbeard and perhaps get a hint as to what to expect when the movie came out.

The book was NOT a Disney book, as I soon found out.

One night, as thunder rumbled outside from an early spring thunderstorm, I lay in bed and started reading the book.  The first part was like a mini history of Edward Teach and his last days as the British navy chased him down.  

Blackbeard was NOT a nice person in real life.  He certainly did not try to endear himself to children, or to anyone else for that matter.  He was hard as nails and quite terrifying, seemingly not to notice injuries for the bloodlust that drove him to do his dirty deeds.

He died a gruesome death (and by this point I knew none of this would probably be in the movie), and I felt really uneasy as I turned out my reading light.  I had stayed up too late as it was because I couldn't put the book down, and the storm outside made things even more spooky.  I was maybe 9 or 10 at the time and not fond of "ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night."

I lay in bed, watching the shadows of the tree branches as they grasped, clawlike, with each flash of lightning.  Blackbeard had died long long ago, and in the Carolinas nonetheless.  There was no way his ghost could have known a boy in Oklahoma City was thinking about him.  There was no way his ghost would travel that distance to frighten a kid on a stormy night.

But then...

"Psst," came a sound out of the darkness.

I froze.  Of all the nights to decide to sleep on the top bunk of my bed, I had to pick a spooky one.

"Psst!" came the sound again.

"H...hello?" I squeaked.

"Psssssst!"

Fear lending nearly superhuman abilities to me, I swear I flew from my top bunk and through my door into the hall out outside the door to my parents' bedroom.

"Mo-o-o-o-mmm!!!  Daaaaddddd!!!  Blackbeard is after me!!!" I yelled, pounding on their door.

They came out to calm me down.

"He's in my room!  I was reading about him and he showed up and he's after me!"  

And, as parents so often do when pirate ghosts are after their children, they calmly turned my light on and looked in my room.  I was hiding behind them, and wierdly comforted by the fact that Blackbeard would have to go through them to get to me.  Until I realized a ghost could just pass though them and get me.  I was doomed.

"Pssst," came the sound again.

"Here he is," my dad said, way too calm for me.

I looked around my dad and saw, not a fierce ghostly pirate, but my dog who had fallen asleep and was snoring as he was undoubtedly dreaming of things other than pirates.  He had a tendency to sleep more deeply the stormier the weather.

Silly dog!

Silly me!