Rewarding Hobby-Dealing With Gratitude

 Something I've noticed for many years now, is the conclusion to a successful lost ring, lost jewelry, lost necklace, pendant, and so on hunt is the happiness of the person who thought they would never see this item again. Hand over open mouth, jumping up and down, heartfelt hugs and the plethora of body language with verbal exclamations that go with the realization that your electronic magic wand has turned an unfathomed loss, into an unbelievable reunion! Here, at this point, is where the rubber meets the road. The person, or couple, or family holds out their hand with a wad of bills...maybe $20 or can go as high as $1000 at times and everywhere in between. The sudden quiet is deafening, the birds are frozen in flight, the world has momentarily stopped turning.

My Wife Returning A Lost Wedding Band

As part of our prime directive, our detectorist mantra, we never ask for a reward, but if one is offered? You, of course, are above all that, and your benevolence shines with a nuclear radiance...sometimes blinding you to the situation as it really stands. "No, no. I was glad to find it...that's what we/I do as a service...no, no...!" Let me say this about that: there is nothing wrong with being magnanimous, especially when you consider the time it took you to find it, or the magnitude of the recovery. BUT when it was truly a herculean effort, say in a dirty muddy scummy side canal, or alligator infested pond, or several days of pounding the ground, the atmosphere changes. Your equipment is specialized and expensive, the experience and proficiency in using that equipment is a hard-to-find commodity and traveling to the site is getting more and more expensive. Yes, yes, you have a great retirement nest-egg, yes everyone admires your charity and holds you as a hero, and it may well be deserved, as I have seen time and again, detectorists selflessly even put themselves in danger to recover and unrecoverable heirloom. But I'm talking about not a physical daring-do, but the mental state of the person who experienced the loss then the miraculous recovery. They really want to reward you...they really do! No one wants to live in the shadow of debt of another, and they would like to see you have a nice dinner out, or a movie as a token of their thanks for what you did.

So, as they hold a reward in their outstretched hand, I would advise you to thank them profusely and take it! Let me explain, especially to those of you that are mentally accusing me of being a detection hooker!  Although it is not really quid pro quo, it comes close. They go away happy for the return of the unreturnable, and you go away happy, maybe going to dinner and see Maverick with your wife on their dime tonight. Or not...just consider it.

Pyrate Tyme - The Real Deal

 One question...why do many metal detecting club's logo's feature a pirate ship, face, or flag? Pirates, or Privateers as they were originally called, were not nice people. They were dangerous seagoing criminal gangs that literally robbed, raped, and plundered ships and coastal villages. What does that have to do with the metal detecting hobby? Since Captain Jack Sparrow graced the big screen many years ago, that loveable rouge, funny, most times drunk, and highly humorous, we have gotten a very biased opinion of pirates. As a matter of fact, most everyone who lived quite a bit after these seagoing gangs were caught and hanged, or jailed, has a slanted view of these guys. 

First of all pirates rarely, if ever, buried their treasure. They didn't have time to do so, always on the run, dodging Navel patrols or angry shipping companies. And usually after a few nights of drunken carousing in a safe port, they had little treasure left anyway. They were a "live for today" crowd, and many didn't expect to even see tomorrow. Being a common sailor in a 16th Century navy was a horror; beaten, worked to death, or executed for minor offences. Many men were "shanghaied" or basically knocked cold and brought aboard ship, and when they woke up at sea, they had no choice but to work as part of the crew. One pirate was recorded as saying "In an honest service there is thin commons, low wages and hard labor. In piracy, there is plenty and satiety, pleasure and ease, liberty and power; and who would not balance creditor, when all the hazard that is run for it, at worst, is only a sour look or two  at hanging?" He ended the thought with " No, a merry life and a short one shall be my motto!"

Several of my favorite Pirate reads

Being part of a pirate crew was, strange as it sounds, freedom in a democratic society. Pirate crews would elect their own captains, if the captain did not work out, or caused the group problems the pirate crew was more than quick in replacing him immediately! They voted on what prize (ship) t take in battle to gain the most treasure with the least amount of harm to themselves. And their take was not always gold and silver, it was also rum, alcohol, booze, fine silks and linen cloth...and occasionally women. A hostage meant money in the bank. Anything they could turn a profit on. Many governors in the colonies and Caribbean nations would have dealings with the pirates, buying what they stole at reduced prices and reselling them in their sphere of influence. Kind of a 16th Century E-Bay, but without the return policy...or the hassles! Another fallacy is pirates regularly made people "...walk the plank!" There was no plank, until several books, and later movies, poured that into the mystery mix that were pirate societies. A lot of the fabricated bunk about pirates originally came from a 1724 publication called "A General History of the Robberies and Murders of the Most Notorious Pyrates" This made a lot of money for the author, but it was equivalent to our reality television, looks good, but it really is not real! I've read several books on pirates that were very good, including a book years ago I managed to get, an original 1619 copy of "Pyrates Of The Caribbean," which I stupidly loaned to an acquaintance, and never saw the book again! If you get a chance, read up on piracy...a fascinating subject!