A Little Patchy History About Pirates

When my young daughter was diagnosed with a lazy eye we had to put a sticky eyepatch on her stronger eye for an hour or two a day so that the weaker eye would get a workout.

This was not much fun as you can imagine with a very young child. Some days we went through three or four...or even five patches per day because we were replacing the one she had just ripped off. Then there was always the fun of when she would find a patch, take the backing off, and stick it in her hair in the middle of her head. We had to use scissors a few times.

So what did we do? We tried to make it all a big game. "You've only got one eye? You must be a pirate! Because pirates always wore patches."

The only problem with that? Well now you've just told a little girl that pirates always wore patches, and you get to endure the game of one-thousand questions.

"So why did they wear patches? Did they have a bad eye too? Did they like their patch or not? Did their mommy tell them to put it back on when they took it off? Did they eat goldfish?"

"Goldfish? I'm not sure honey."

Of course, the only logical thing to do as a parent at that point is to research it. Because apparently there were a lot of bad eyes swabbing the decks of those old pirate ships and it didn't make much sense that they all had lost an eye. If losing an eye was that common, then there would probably be a lot of blind pirates, cause if you can lose one eye really easily, you can lose another eye pretty easily, too. And unfortunately, two eyes are all we've got.

And that was when I discovered the eye-opening truth of why pirates wore patches.

First, I'd like you to imagine something. It's a bright beautiful day outside. The sky is Caribbean blue, not a cloud in sight. Warm sun on your face. It's beautiful... and blinding.

When it's time to go inside you walk through the door, close it behind you… and then you'd better keep your hands out in front of you and take small steps or else you might be reenacting the story of "when Toe met Doorframe" and all the words that come with that story which, let's face it, should not be said in front of a two-year-old, please.

So if you're as blind as a mole when you come indoors after a bright shiny day, it's hard to imagine how you might - One - rob and plunder when you can't tell if you're grabbing gold or lead, and - Two - fend off any sailors who may have been belowdecks all day long and have no problem seeing in the dark.

This, me matey, is where the eye patch came in handy.

Here’s how it went: Outside in the daylight, our bloody pirate wore the patch on, say, his left eye. When he rushed belowdecks, he switched the patch to his right eye, and suddenly the issue of day vision vs night vision was no longer a problem.

So does it work? You may ask. Would I ever tell a story without testing out the theory myself?

This winter was one with a lot of snow for a lot of people. The same was true for me where I live, and one afternoon the clouds broke, the temperatures rose, it was a beautiful, blindingly sunny day and I had to take the dogs out.

Going from indoors to outdoors on a day like that is rather painful. Your irises start squealing and demanding to know what in the blazes you were thinking!

For the first few minutes of the walk I kept my eyes squinted and my right eye almost completely shut. And then I remembered the pirates, and it was time for an experiment.

I covered my right eye, and managed quite heroic feats in my opinion, holding two leashes and cleaning up after the dogs, all one-handed so I could maintain my very important pirate patch. When they were done I hurried back inside to test it out. Guess what? It worked!

The sun-exposed eye cast an incredibly dark purple fog over everything, but the night vision eye could see normally and clearly. I cheered excitedly and did a little dance, and, honestly, felt like I might want to go plunder perhaps, but I somehow managed to maintain control of that urge.

So the next time you're out on a blindingly bright day, become a pirate for a minute and see what it's like.

Let me just leave you with one last question. If patching a young child's eye makes one eye stronger and in turn the other eye a little weaker, then did the pirates have a weaker night vision eye because it was patched so often?

Well, from what I’ve heard, they only wore the patches when they would be attacking other ships. Good thing, too. We wouldn't be wanting any blind pirates, now would we matey?