Day 5 - Glass Beads!

Today's the day of the event!

When we landed last night, I texted our friend that we'd arrived at our hotel, near the event site. She was minutes from landing herself, and she wanted to get her tent set up before the rain came.

My hubby and I are members of the SCA, a medieval ages re-enactment group. And this would be the first event we'd be attending since lockdown.

I don't know what to think. We've lost way, way too many faces that I will never see again on this side of the veil. It felt strange getting back into garb.

But our friend wanted to meet and talk events – specifically, we're planning to have a Metalsmiths' Symposium in a little under a year, and we want to plan. Plots? Plenty. But planning pursuits 'pon paper, peruse possibilities, and present potent, plausible prototypes? Possibly!

While planning our anniversary trip, I realized there was an event up near the border with Canada that would coincide with our driving plans. Normally pretty far away, but only about an hour or so for our friend. And, of course, we can't go to an event without offering to teach glass beads. Our friend offered to bring her kits, conveniently packed from doing them at an event a few weeks ago.

So we got there the mext morning, checked in, and I tried texting... and my text bounced. Ah, technology, you are useless in the middle of a forest! We did connect, but when she asked why we didn't text her, I had to tell her my “carrier pigeon” died.

Yes, I do have a weird sense of humor.

We commenced to the setting of the up-ness. This was a unique place for me, for an event, and I've been in the SCA for about thirty years. We were in the middle of the woods, but it was a person's private property. Lovely spot surrounded by the scent of fresh pine, and our canvas-tented area was in a grove with small clearings for the stuff to happen. A birch rail fence marked our location, the branches of the trees chosen to make the clearings. The boards from the trunk were seasoning at the side, to make a small building later.

We had a front row seat to the melee fighting, which is quite unusual for a class.

What was even cooler, is that we were one of the first classes to be taught there! Normally, this event is all about fighting and cooking and eating. Not a bad thing, really, when that's what the local group is into. But for people to travel for hours, just to teach something cool and interesting? It doesn't happen.

Well, I have mentioned that I'm a weirdo. That's okay. I've always been one, and I don't plan to change any time soon. Over a half century of keeping my personal air space as strange as possible!

We weren't even remotely set up when the first potential students wandered over, within clouds of bright curiosity, asking questions. Sorry, folx, you're already hooked. I know that look.

Well, with four torch places, and three teachers, we were in for a fun time, right?

We. Were. SLAMMED.

Those torches went on – and barely stopped all day. All three of us! All the people! All day! I was almost tied to a chair and forced to eat, because diabetic on a super-restrictive diet. And I still got out of my chair twice to help, till I was ushered back and tied to my chair again. Same for mid-afternoon snack...

I took exactly four pictures the whole day. Two of my friend on the torch, and two of the salamander I guided towards a tree for safety. They may be representations of fire in the medieval time period, but certainly not when it comes to real fire. And MAPP gas torched are Right Out. Speaking of...

We went through so many bottles of MAPP gas!

We talked and chatted and taught till our talkers were hoarse.

It was wonderful! It was delightful! Seeing faces light up, looking at the Cool Neat Things they had just created, and the fact that li'l ol' me has been the one to teach those skills, give the hunger to learn and create a focus...

It's heady stuff. It's amazing. It's one of the things I live for.

And we got more than double shots of it! Freaking awesome, people, I gotta tell ya.

We got a lot of feedback, too. Our students ran around to the other things going on, showing off the treasures they'd made and excitedly chatting at how cool an experience it was. Many people came round to tell us, and thank us. It was a wonderful feeling.

What is also very cool, from a personal point of view: right now, the East Kingdom of the SCA has a brace of Kings. If thou art a hater, fornicateth thou the eff off right now, because I will not brook such a countenance within mine life. We choose our Royal in a Crown Tourney, and by various unscripted one-on-one fights the best fighters work their way up to the finals. The Royal Consort – the one being fought for, not the one doing the actual fighting – is a good friend and we go way back, and he's such a sweetheart.

I gave him a gift of some glass bead pendants done in a period style with a design the Royals were using as a royal seal, and he was so tickled! He loved them!

Another thing I live for: giving gifts that are so personal and thoughtful that the recipient's face lights up.

He was able to sneak away from his Royal duties for a bit to come over and make his own glass pendant with the stamp I had designed for him, then gifted him with the stamp. It was freaking awesome.

While I was spotting him on the torch, I discovered I had a “comfort rock.” A rock had snuggled against my ankle. I thought it was a tree root, till I looked down. Well, it came home with me. I'm not going to turn down a rock when it doesn't trip me.

For a Royal Progress, it was a small event. For that event site, they got inundated with people. It was fun to watch, when I had a few milliseconds of glance-around time. The Royals had more free time to relax and have fun.

The court after the day's activities were also quite memorable, and we saw a new Baron being elevated. It was bestowed on the gentle who owned the site, and did so much to make his “back yard” into a site for Scadians. Including a little tavern, which is a haven for teetotalers. It's hard, in the SCA, to avoid the tipple. Even I, who's deathly allergic to the stuff, has felt the pressure over the years.

(Now that we know, my husband and I are going to stop at Saratoga National Park on the way up, when we're invited back, and pick up some shrubs for that tavern. Shrubs are flavored syrups that one usually adds to cocktails for flavoring. Simple syrups ramped up, if you will. I've written about my love affair with sekanjabin, which is close to a shrub. So are syllabubs. Dang tasty, and excellent when added to water or seltzer or tonic water. I just had a small cup of soda this afternoon, with rose geranium symple syrup added to tonic water. Great flavorings for boba tea as well. Just saying. NOM.)

We would have stayed for feast, but I needed food, and it would take a while to get feast going with all the congratulations and suchlike. We gave our spots away to others on the waiting list, and headed for the hotel. Yes, I got food in me on time.

Exhausting day. Glorious day. Wonderful to see old friends (including one we hadn't seen in over twenty years!), to sit back, relax, and teach, and get back into an accepting space. I'd missed that, with the plague. So many ways to contact people, and still so isolated. We're a funny race of beings.