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RIP Rickey “the Pirate” Taylor I’ve always been grateful that I made amends with Rickey. Sometime after the events detailed below, I left LA for a few months and gave Rickey the final t-shirt, the one we’d been holding onto for ourselves. They were cool shirts after all. Rickey was ecstatic. Not just to have a shirt to sell, but I think he was also grateful to break the detente that had existed between us for months. Who knows. It was hard to tell with Rickey. When I returned, he ran down the street to greet me warmly, remembering I’d been away and noticing I’d lost weight on my journey. From then on, our encounters were short, but warm and friendly. I never gave him any money. Maybe he asked if we wanted to buy something a few times. He wasn’t pushy. He often tried to hug us or help with bags… the same old Rickey from before all this nasty t-shirt business. And then we moved to Oakland. During our last visit downtown in May, we saw Rickey. It was a pleasant reunion right there on the corner of Sixth and Spring. He tried to sell us a video camera. We kept it brief. Like always. Rest in Peace, Rickey. I’ve had a lot of beefs with people over the years, but none ended with truly letting bygones be bygones. You were a class act. There will only be one Downtown Pirate.
© 2011-2014 Originally published in Piltdownlad #5: The Detour Guide Illustrations on pages 4-7 by Irina Dessaint
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Rickey The Pirate immortalized on the chalk board in front of Spring for Coffee. Art by Nick Knudson. 8
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The postcard. Art by Nick Knudson. 10
While Rickey was hustling these cards, a local news channel interviewed him and they shot a close up of the card. 11
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Rickey’s list of pre-sales.
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Since we spent all our money on t-shirts this year, we couldn’t afford any other presents for the folks...
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