A little more than eight hundred years ago last April 22nd I had the strength of ten because my heart was pure. My name was then too Richard and I was a champion of just causes, a knight and held rightful claim to a legitimate piece of real estate. However while on an errand of duty from Europe (the Crusade), a closest friend was captured and imprisoned by a monarch in the Slavic city fortress of Kievrus, then in allegiance with the powers in Austria. The monarch could have killed him but for reasons of virtue my friend's freedom could be attained only if he could answer a seemingly unanswerable query. If he failed during a year of detainment he would then be killed. The question was:
'What do women really want?'
Without benefit of my family's crest, "The Lionhearted," my faithful friend shuttered and knew that the question might well perplex even the most knowledgeable as it seemed an almost impossible question. But as he could define love, his hope was alive, and, for the sake of sheer life itself, he accepted the monarch's proposition to have this answered by that year's end (1194).
He began by polling everyone from the daughters of royalty to the prostitutes, from the priests to the court jesters. In all nearly everyone was spoken to but no satisfactory answer did he find. What a few better informed people did mention however was that a witch, evidently a descendant of the ancient founding Vikings, a woman who lived in the direction of the setting sun, somewhere east of the Carpathian Mountains, might be the only one that could know the answer. But these same folks also warned that the price would likely be high since this witch was known to have traveled half the earth in the gathering of her skills.
As the last days approached my closest friend had found no other recourse but to travel west and speak to the witch, and she agreed to answer this if her price were accepted. That price was that she wanted to marry his closest friend, ME! He was totally horrified: She was hunchbacked and hideous, had seemingly only one tooth, smelled like sewage, and often obscene noises came from somewhere within her bowels. So nobly did he refuse to allow his friend to marry such a repugnant creature.
But I had heard of my friend's plight in time, and as lion-hearted as a situation warrants I traveled and spoke to my friend and stated that nothing was too big a sacrifice compared to his losing his life. Hence, my wedding was proclaimed and the witch finally answered the question, that expensive verbiage being:
"What a woman really wants is to be able to be in charge of her own life."
Everyone instantly knew (but evidently somehow forgot again over the passage of eight hundred years, (..except, that is, for a very few enlightened men of Irish lineage in a place later to be called, "Michigan") was that the witch had uttered a great truth and that my friend's life would be spared.
And so it went. The monarch spared my best friend's life and granted him his freedom, ...but oh, the wedding. My friend (his name incidentally was, quite interestingly enough, Bob, which was not an all that common a name for the late twelfth century), who willingly would have given his life for me, was torn between his own personal relief and disconcerting anguish as to my anticipated fate. I however chose to be proper, respectful and honorable. The witch, not withstanding, chose to put her worse manners on display ~eating with her hands, belching and presenting wind brewed within the annals ('anals?') of her lower torso, so transporting everyone beyond the land of uncomfortablity.
That wedding night did come indeed and I withdrew within myself until the last moment before I entered the bedroom. And what a sight awaited me! The most beautiful woman I ever saw lay there before me. Totally aghast, I asked what had happened. This unbelievably beautiful woman (great cheek bones, green eyes, etc.) replied that since I had been so kind when she had been a witch that half the time she would be her horrible self and the other half of the time she would be this most beautiful maiden. What a cunning stunt it was! But, she required of me further ...which would I want her to be during the day and which during the night? Right then and there I had to make my choice.
I chose to let her choose for herself, upon which she announced that she would be beautiful all the time because I respected her and let her be in charge of her own life. Thereafter, as usual, I lived happily ever after*.
(*NB: That is, until I died on April 6, 1199)
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