[Artemisia] Estrella

[Cat]

Just remember, several have asked for war stories - so here are my  
war stories...   heh heh heh

I had a strange but wonderful war.  I got held up on traveling down  
and did not arrive until Saturday morning. (2 days to get to war!  
me!  the marathon driving!  unheard of!!! Absurd!!! I'm so ashamed...)

I think the worst of my war was losing my car keys - and knowing my  
extra keys were in Idaho...  NOT what you want to do at a place like  
Estrella.  But more on that later.

I opted not to fight Saturday because of the healing formerly-torn  
ligament (tore one in my side in November, while coughing, of all  
things...).  It was unhappy over the long drive, so I decided to err  
on the side of caution (and for the joy of not hearing my spouse say  
yet still another time "so what'd you hurt this time?"  encouraging,  
isn't he?).  I was off to the volunteer point to see where I could  
put some time in for Artemisia when I was knocked off my feet to run  
into someone I met in AS 17 and is one of my oldest and dearest  
friends in the SCA.  I thought she had gone inactive after becoming  
ill and having had to retire early, and so had lost track of her.   
But there she was, the first person to ever pound it into my dense  
head that blisters and heat exhaustion at war were entirely  
avoidable...  (As someone who was a professor or dean of nursing all  
her life, she was and still is entitled, in my book.)  Well, that  
reunion took about four hours.  Running into the folks from my old  
barony in Calontir was another slice of time.  I could hardly believe  
how many old friends I ran into unexpectedly.

Then I was jumped by the Queen of the West. YIPE!  Her Majesty, whom  
I had not yet met, put me to work ("no, no, no...problem your  
majesty, how might I help you...?") upon being told that I and an old  
friend (with whom I was chatting with at that moment) were former  
senior heralds of the West Kingdom and also scribes and (what  
mattered at that moment) people who had experience with the kingdom  
seal.  "We need these scrolls sealed in time for court!"  They didn't  
have the "kit" used for doing wax properly.  Mary and I had to  
improvise.  There were a lot of scrolls, 14 in all - some for the  
mini-West court before grand court, and some for grand court.  It was  
an amazing crazy-making frenetic frantic and awesomely-fun three  
hours.  We recruited Vis. Anne of Bradford, Godless-like laurel and  
pel from Oertha and all around good person-in-a-pinch and taught her  
on the fly how to cut medieval seal ribbon suspensions, which is the  
period way you get seals to work when you have slippery paper instead  
of sticky parchment or vellum.   [[[(yes, Caryn, I'll teach a class  
on it if you want...just thought I'd beat you to the inevitable  
question this time... ;-) ;-) ;-)]]] I ended up part of the time  
melting the sealing wax (the good stuff, not the cheap stuff from the  
card shop in the mall) with a charcoal lighter right onto the ribbons  
- and had Anne standing right there with the fire extinguisher in  
hand and aimed in case I lit the wax stick on fire instead of just  
melting it.  (I've started sealing wax fires before - it's easy to  
do!)  So much for my adrenalin quota for the month!  Yipe yipe  
yipe!!!  So the three of us had an assembly line going and indeed got  
it all done by court - and left the Queen of the West a happy  
camper.  (She gave me a really pretty jade leaf favor on a stick pin  
for my efforts and named me and Anne and Mary her "combat scribes."   
A very nice queen, almost as nice as ours, which is nice indeed :-)

I stopped by where I thought most of the Artemisians were camping on  
and off - and saw some folks (including my favorite evil leprechaun)  
but never ran into their majesties or Cas or Constance or that  
swashbuckling dancing dude from the Barony of Beauticians or...   
***sigh***  I did get jumped by this absolutely ecstatic Azir who  
told me all about his white scarf - though it was kinda hard to  
recognize him since he was floating at least eight feet off the  
ground.  I had to get some rope and drag him back down before I could  
see who it was who was talking non-stop about how happy he way.  That  
much happiness is contagious, you know.  :)  It was really really  
cool, watching him walk on air.

If I had known there were pels to be made, I would have gone to grand  
court.  As it was, I took the time to have a long needed in-person  
talk with my protege (who currently lives 900 miles away from me) and  
then took my slightly burnt fingertips to the chirurgeons tent for  
some burn cream and ended helping out there undercover for a little  
bit.  And since I'm am not at all a party animal, went off to Camp  
Motel for some sleep.  I didn't even have time to go shopping!  What  
a happy crazy day.

Sunday started by my getting my sticker on my helm and then when I  
got back to my car in the overflow parking lot to get my shield and  
weapons, I discovered I didn't have my car keys.  Thus began the  
great quest for the car keys - I missed the first couple of battles  
because of it.  I tried hefting my war shield but the formerly-torn  
ligament said no.  So I strapped on my 14-inch "St George and the  
Wagon" buckler and reconciled myself to dying a lot.  I had made  
arrangements to fight with Sir Einar aus Enveldt, to whom I was  
squired 25 years ago in Caid. It's a household thing, ok, with my  
longest-standing household affiliation.  He and his wife, Mistress  
Gabrielle have gotten back active in the SCA after 2 decades and  
three children (really GOOD kids too - they did something right in  
raising that lot) so we've been trying to spend time together.  I  
lost sight of him after the Champions' Battle, which he fought in and  
not being to find him again on the field, in the absence of any  
recognizable Artemisians on the field, I attached myself to another  
old friend for the rest of the fighting, Sir John Theophilus, who was  
carrying one of the West's banners.  Baron Wilhelm showed up and  
fought with us for a while and then I lost track of him - but let me  
pass on here that both Sir John and Fabian, King of the West, pass on  
their thanks to him for the time that he spent lending his prowess to  
their war efforts (I promised Fab and John that I'd do that for them  
in a way that folks would know, and so now I have kept my word :).   
The West says thanks, Wilhelm.

I had an amazingly good time fighting and was astounded that I was  
killing more than killed me despite being on the field with a Pas  
buckler and short sword. Being one of those height-challenged people,  
usually the only thing I'm good for at wars is being shield-wall  
fodder, experienced shield-wall fodder (I come with recommendations),  
but fodder none-the-less.  (Yes, at one time I was part of the  
Calontir Borg ;-)  So maybe all that practice last year actually did  
me some good, Reinmar! :).   (Sir John tickled me pink by saying it  
was because I fought best with little round shields I could punch -  
though I suspect he's just trying to encourage me to get back to  
fighting more often).  In the little West-King-pontificating-at- 
Westie-fighters speech thing after the fighting (Fabian likes to do  
little speech thingies - thank God he's not bad at it), the King  
singled me out in front of all my old fighting buddies and gave me my  
own demi-sun favor (gift of Sir John) for following and fighting for  
the banner that day.  Could have knocked me over with a feather. It  
meant a lot, especially in front of a bunch of folks, many of whom  
now have belts, that I taught how to fight years ago in Cynagua -  
something I think I'd like to get back to doing again, teaching  
fighting, not necessarily in Cynagua - that's a bit far to commute)   
I think I've not stopped smiling ever since, despite getting food  
poisoning on the way home.

I spent the rest of the time shopping...  I found the coolest book on  
the food culture of the early medieval germanic kingdoms!  And one on  
early medieval glass making!  Ooooo......   Happy happy happy!!!    
Must have books...more books...books...books.... (insert slithering  
off to bookshelves noise here)

Overall, a very busy and enjoyable war - probably the best Estrella  
I've ever had.

BUT WAIT!

Moments where maybe you had to be there:

Let me remind you here of the quest for the car keys,  
twice...TWICE... around that damn dust bowl, in the sabatons and the  
full-grieves and the fluted vanbraces and the not-exactly-light  
burgundian fighting coat (no I'm not vain about my armour, not  
really, but vain enough to have metal showing where it matters, and  
that stuff does weigh a few pounds) frantic, FRANTIC!!! mind you, to  
be missing out on the only fighting I'll be able to make at the  
war...  and finally finding the keys, at Alan and Corisande's tent,  
thank God!   And with that great quest for the keys in mind:

So there I am dutifully trudging after Sir John and the banner.  John  
just said to pick a moment and leap into the fray.  I was picking my  
moment there and while trying to time when I might wade in and make a  
difference, got to watch that charge that Alan described, with the  
Spartans and their slippery round shields - it was rather funny,  
especially when some of those folks slipping were the remains of the  
Calontir Borg, several of whom are old friends.  We had a good mutual  
laugh about it afterwards.  But it was also around that time, during  
a hold, that Alan, marshalling, standing on a hay bale pile far above  
my head says:

"Therasia, did you know your car keys are in my tent on my bed?"

I wasn't really aware it was him marshalling until he spoke.  He was  
above the dust cloud whilst I was in it.  Too bad he couldn't see my  
expression behind my sallet...   ;-)

"did you know your car keys were on my bed" indeed . . . . . .   I  
know he meant well but ARG...!!!!!!!!!  Oh my dusty lungs! Oh my  
aching feet!

Maybe you had to be there but my revenge is already planned.  Heh heh  
heh...  Just come to our upcoming event in a few weeks, here in M Eyes.

ttfn,
Therasia, plotting, always plotting...