GWW XVI

I always leave SCA events feeling conflicted and Great Western War XVI was no different. As with anything else in life you get out what you put in, and my camping group (we call our camp Shanty Town and we are thus Shantinians) tends to skim the surface. We spend our time relaxing, disconnecting from our mundane lives, and partying. This is in stark contrast to our friend Liam who has dedicated himself to the game.

Years ago it was my brother that first got us to go to SCA events. He had somehow managed to jump, with both feet, into a widely known group with a serious reputation. We, however, were in no way serious enough to hang out on that level and so Shanty Town was born. We were a shabby group, but we were fun. We started almost immediately to define our sub-subculture. We were opposed to drama and sobriety. We were for friendship (new and old) and creativity. We (being college students or new to our careers) couldn't afford the expensive "period" tents and other camp supplies so we made do with what we could. We had a set of nylon tents for which we built burlap covers. One of our many mottoes became "we aren't dumb, we're poor." 

Now its been years and a couple of us have period tents, all of us have jobs. We have more of the infrastructure and experience that could turn us into a more legitimate group, but our free-spirited origins stay with us. At this event, we brought home made mead and cider, jugs of cheap Carlo Rossi sangria (upon which we had first founded Shanty Town), and expensive rum, whisky, and gin. We are a mixed bag. Maybe it is our inconsistency that keeps us young. We only make it out to a couple of major events each year, so we skim the surface without putting in deep roots.

Now Liam is a knight. He has spent years getting to this point. He hasn't camped with us in a long time. He has found a group to belong to and call family and he is well respected there. He has come a long way and I am proud of him, even if this journey has taken him away from the rest of us. He is a strong man, a good husband and father. His knighting ceremony was at this event (even his father made it to the campsite even though he does not play). I had no idea that it was going to happen, and when some of us went to see him the night before, we were rebuffed by clipboard wielding keepers. Its like we were at different events.

Now I am back in the real world. There are so many more rules here. There is so much to do. I have to prep old computers to go back to the leasing company and deploy new ones to replace them. I have to study physics models of balancing forces and calculating energy lost or gained. In short, I have to get back to reality. Around the campfire, the ideas for new projects grew fast and grand. We want to make all kinds of things, but to what end? I go to an event about once a year, and I hardly need more clutter in my life and my space. Now I am home and the SCA seems so frivolous and far away. I wish I could be more involved, but I just can't.

Great Western War

I went to another SCA event this past weekend. It always hits me hard when I get there and again when I get back, just how different that world is. When Novia and I arrived on Friday afternoon, the first thing we did after setting up camp was to breathe a sigh of relief. We have both been looking forward to the opportunity to turn our phones off and live without technology for a few days. Last weekend, the most technologically advanced thing that I used between 6:00pm Friday and 12:00pm Sunday was a flashlight. It was a wonderful departure from my normal way of life. If I wanted to find someone, I had to look for them. If I wanted information, I had to find someone who had that information. I left my online social networks behind. Things were wonderfully simple.

I am always so torn between my enjoyment of the SCA and my unwillingness to spend too much time in such a pointless activity. There was a brewing contest (which I didn't enter because I was too lazy) and classes on drumming, armor building, leather-working, and various other things. The only class I took was the drumming class. I didn't plan ahead and was too "in-the-moment" to schedule any of the classes. I only did the drum class because I happened to walk by when it happened. I definitely needed the free-floating weekend but if I am going to do this more, then I need to be more purposeful about it. There is much to learn in the SCA but I need to commit a little more to gain access to it. I think that I must enter the pentathlon this year. It is like a crafts fair where you enter in five different categories.

On another note: A friend of mine has made a new family in the SCA. He has discovered a place where he belongs and is valued. My reaction from the same crowd is one of indifference (at best). On Saturday night he was making an announcement that he was going to be a Man-At-Arms (sworn friend) for a knight (think black-belt with a stick). This is a serious promise, and is the precursor to becoming a Squire. He called me a few weeks ago and asked me to be there for the announcement so I was there. The entire time that they were doing their announcements and congratulations for another member of their group who became a knight, my other friends and I stood outside their circle waiting for the Man-At-Arms thing to be done. We sat there literally on the outside of the circle waiting silently and ignored for what seemed like an hour. We didn't belong and were only tolerated because we were friends of someone who did belong.

A little more than a year ago, Novia and I were wandering around at a different SCA event called Potrero War, and we met an interesting group. It was all started when a random stranger offered me a drink (this kind of thing is common) and after having a sip of his rum & coke, I exclaimed "Sweet Jesus" to which he replied "Well yes, actually." At this puzzling reply I took a closer look at my new friend and found that he did in fact bear quite a resemblance to Jesus of Nazareth. He was welcoming, friendly, and very drunk. He introduced us to his friends and invited us to his camp that night for a refill of our refreshments and invited us to come back the next day. We did in fact return and have sought him out at every major event since. He and his group are all fun-loving and relaxed. (I really should retell the stories of 'Sean the Blue-Handed' and 'Bucket of AIDS Joe' sometime)

I don't really know how to feel about all of this. I wonder which of these attitudes I would adopt towards outsiders. Would I be grumpy and elitist or friendly and inviting? I know that I had a lot of fun at the event (despite my hay-fever) and that most of that fun was because of old friends inviting us to party with them. An old high school friend, a new friend from Oregon, and a new friend for San Diego, all of whom I only see at SCA events made me feel incredibly welcome.

SCA Aspects

SCA stands for Society for Creative Anachronism. Basically it is a reenactment group that focuses on Europe from about 600AD to 1500AD. The resultant culture and experience is a cultural hodgepodge of eras and locations, technological levels and styles of dress. I could go on for pages and pages (screens?) of description and analysis of the SCA but for my purposes here I am going to assume a passing level of knowledge.

I went to a weekend camping event called Great Western War this past weekend and I have been thinking about how much of my time I want to dedicate and how deep I want to get in. There is so much to do that one could make it a full time adventure. There is garb and camp gear to be made and fighting or period crafts to perfect. Some people get so immersed that their 'mundane' identity becomes the secondary one and the SCA becomes their real life. I don't think that I ever want to get to that point but I do want to become more part of the society. There are people that share my love of handcrafts and are willing to share their knowledge.

I have been to two large camping events this season and the experiences make me want to make the SCA a part of my life. The question remains as to how to take action and fit myself in. I think that I am going to make contact with a few of the master craftsmen and attempt to persuade them to teach me something of their crafts (mainly ceramics and metalworking) and to make time to hang out with the locals at the weekly meetup.