Monday, January 25, 2010

Admitting to SCA Snobbery

I went to a friend's birthday party this weekend. About 1/4 of the party-goers were people I know from the SCA, the rest being his "normal" friends. I've been to several of his parties before, and at every one, the SCA people tend to cluster together in the kitchen, telling fighting stories, describing (or working on!) the next A&S project, discussing travel details to the next event, etc. The rest of them congregate around the bar or the stereo in the living room, drink, play horrible hip-hop/rap/pop music and try to find someone to go home with/take them home.

The point of this story is not to say that SCA people are better than non-SCA people. While the majority of the friends I've made in the years since I began doing medieval reenacting are, indeed, Scadians, I have numerous friendships outside the SCA that I value every bit as much. I've just begun to observe that I don't seem to play well with "normal" people anymore. It is certainly possible for me to hold a non-historical-in-nature conversation, and even enjoy it, but I constantly come up with SCA stories, metaphors, phrases, that I want to insert into the conversation, and generally have to pass up, because, well, sometimes it just takes too long to explain! I've also discovered that I'm more attracted to men in kilts and/or tunics, with an overabundance of facial hair, than clean-shaven dudes in t-shirts and baseball caps. I'd far rather watch a good sword fight than the superbowl. I've been known to wear my tunics with jeans to class/work, and SCA jewelry goes with everything, right? I bring A&S projects when I go home to visit my parents, to work on and to show off. Garb is the most comfortable clothing I own. My bookshelf is filled with research material, and even the novels and movies I own are generally historical in nature.

Perhaps this post shouldn't be about admitting to SCA snobbery, but rather: Realizing a Need to Re-Learn Social Skills. But then again...I think I like my life this way.
I don't think I believe in second chances anymore. Life isn't generous enough to allow mulligans.

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Second Chances

How do you recognize an opportunity for what it is, when it comes, instead of as just a passing event? How do you know that, in the future, you're going to regret passing this up? And when the merest glimmer of a second chance presents itself to you, how long do you wait for it to materialize into really, and truly, a gloriously forgiving second chance? How long do you wait until you realize that in waiting to see if it materializes, you're letting so many other things pass you by?

I hate waiting. But second chances are Providential. How do you pass that up, even if it means waiting a little longer?