SCA...memories and shit like that
Pursuant to my last blog entry, I feel the need to expound upon it. Maybe even at great length!
So, the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA).
I had originally joined the SCA when my kid was six, although I had attended a couple of demos that the local group had put on each year. I was too afraid to put myself out there and try something new.
Until I finally did.
It is through the SCA that I found my voice and broke out of my shell. I learned confidence to try new things, meet new people, and to travel to places I never would have.
I also found who my friends were.
In the aftermath of my banishment I learned that many of those I considered friends thought nothing of bad-mouthing me behind my back. One - and this one hurt me the hardest - took my admission of having been a drug addict several years before I joined the SCA and, despite having been clean for the several years leading up to me joining, took it upon himself to claim that money that had gone missing while in my possession was used for drugs. Obviously, that's one friendship burned - even if he ever grew the balls to apologize he'd be told to fuck off. Even if that had been even remotely true, friends wouldn't just turn their backs on the person right off the bat.
Many folks I considered friends turned their backs on me, especially once the banishment was handed down. I didn't even know there were talks of me being banished, until I got the official notification in the mail stating I was banished, my membership revoked and denied. I was never given the chance to defend myself against all the accusations that had been made against me. And a lot of people chose to believe the lies and slander against me.
Considering I lived and worked in the same geographical area as all these people, it made life quite difficult. Especially when I started working at a place where several SCAdians also worked - the asshole from above, being one of them. There were even people who did not want to be on the same team as I was or sit near me, until they weren't given any choice...and then they realized that a lot of the lies being told simply weren't true. I wouldn't have been able to do a highly technical job if I was as strung out on cocaine as the rumours had made me out to be, and I had been making a serious attempt at trying to repay the debt I owed.
Y'see, money did go missing while it was in my possession so I accepted full responsibility for it, even though the money should not have been in my hands at that point anyway. When the shire seneschal bails on you several times for getting you to the bank that the shire bank account was with so you could 1) deposit the money, and 2) sign the signatory card, you tend to end up with cash on hand that you shouldn't have. And dealing with a break-in and the possibility of a friend throwing out the unmarked paper bag holding said cash while being nice and cleaning my place for me, well, it was a cluster fuck waiting for a place to happen. The fact the money was missing got discovered, I was questioned about it and even when to an all-shire meeting about it instead of hiding away.
I had agreed to make payments as I was able to, despite being between jobs and trying to make ends meet while on welfare as a single parent. I even made an initial cash payment of $75 to the shire seneschal that I never got a receipt for and it was never entered into the books against the amount of money that had come up as missing. Not a single payment that was made against that amount was correctly applied and noted, and in the end - after launching an inquiry and being told that the debt was still the same amount it was at the beginning - I simply gave up.
I've had a lot of years to think about everything that happened before and since that time of my life. There were a lot of red flags that should have twigged me onto the fact that several of the folks I had thought were my friends never thought of me as a friend, that I was only wanted around when I was useful. That goes right on up the line to the don of the fencing school I was a part of - I'm pretty sure the ONLY reason he asked me to join was because I could sew. And I wanted to belong bad enough that I accepted, even though I could barely stand the man when he was in holier-than-thou mode, which was most of the time, both SCA and mundanely.
So, seventeen years later I'm living in an area where the SCA is starting back up after being dormant for a lot of years. I had spoken to a few of the members, some of who had played elsewhere and knew some of the people I had known back in the day. For some folks, things never change apparently.
I had started poking around to see what I could find out concerning overturning my banishment. Let me tell you, the SCA is very secretive about a lot of things...including the information that short of murder it is impossible for banishment to be truly permanent, as even banishments handed out for the reason mine was last fifteen years at the most. Not to mention that apparently there is no record of my banishment or even the reason I was banished for. Oh, and apparently my Award of Arms wasn't recorded, even though I have the physical proof of it. The local seneschal for the group I'm with now is looking into that for me - she is also the one that gave me the information about my banishment expiring after fifteen years.
So, I'm back to doing SCA stuff. Once I can afford it, I will get a paid membership once again, and go from there. I have some ideas in my head for garb, both fighting and off the field, and I have plans on setting up some sort of shire library.
I will admit that I have been a bit nervous about jumping back into the SCA, especially after my last go round with it, but I know that the people here are different. No egos the sizes of any that I'd dealt with my previous go. And it's a different kingdom, and a smaller population here, so my fingers are crossed that things don't go entirely to hell. Mind you, I'm also staying the hell out of the politics while I'm at it. I just want to go out there and have some fun again.
So, the Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA).
I had originally joined the SCA when my kid was six, although I had attended a couple of demos that the local group had put on each year. I was too afraid to put myself out there and try something new.
Until I finally did.
It is through the SCA that I found my voice and broke out of my shell. I learned confidence to try new things, meet new people, and to travel to places I never would have.
I also found who my friends were.
In the aftermath of my banishment I learned that many of those I considered friends thought nothing of bad-mouthing me behind my back. One - and this one hurt me the hardest - took my admission of having been a drug addict several years before I joined the SCA and, despite having been clean for the several years leading up to me joining, took it upon himself to claim that money that had gone missing while in my possession was used for drugs. Obviously, that's one friendship burned - even if he ever grew the balls to apologize he'd be told to fuck off. Even if that had been even remotely true, friends wouldn't just turn their backs on the person right off the bat.
Many folks I considered friends turned their backs on me, especially once the banishment was handed down. I didn't even know there were talks of me being banished, until I got the official notification in the mail stating I was banished, my membership revoked and denied. I was never given the chance to defend myself against all the accusations that had been made against me. And a lot of people chose to believe the lies and slander against me.
Considering I lived and worked in the same geographical area as all these people, it made life quite difficult. Especially when I started working at a place where several SCAdians also worked - the asshole from above, being one of them. There were even people who did not want to be on the same team as I was or sit near me, until they weren't given any choice...and then they realized that a lot of the lies being told simply weren't true. I wouldn't have been able to do a highly technical job if I was as strung out on cocaine as the rumours had made me out to be, and I had been making a serious attempt at trying to repay the debt I owed.
Y'see, money did go missing while it was in my possession so I accepted full responsibility for it, even though the money should not have been in my hands at that point anyway. When the shire seneschal bails on you several times for getting you to the bank that the shire bank account was with so you could 1) deposit the money, and 2) sign the signatory card, you tend to end up with cash on hand that you shouldn't have. And dealing with a break-in and the possibility of a friend throwing out the unmarked paper bag holding said cash while being nice and cleaning my place for me, well, it was a cluster fuck waiting for a place to happen. The fact the money was missing got discovered, I was questioned about it and even when to an all-shire meeting about it instead of hiding away.
I had agreed to make payments as I was able to, despite being between jobs and trying to make ends meet while on welfare as a single parent. I even made an initial cash payment of $75 to the shire seneschal that I never got a receipt for and it was never entered into the books against the amount of money that had come up as missing. Not a single payment that was made against that amount was correctly applied and noted, and in the end - after launching an inquiry and being told that the debt was still the same amount it was at the beginning - I simply gave up.
I've had a lot of years to think about everything that happened before and since that time of my life. There were a lot of red flags that should have twigged me onto the fact that several of the folks I had thought were my friends never thought of me as a friend, that I was only wanted around when I was useful. That goes right on up the line to the don of the fencing school I was a part of - I'm pretty sure the ONLY reason he asked me to join was because I could sew. And I wanted to belong bad enough that I accepted, even though I could barely stand the man when he was in holier-than-thou mode, which was most of the time, both SCA and mundanely.
So, seventeen years later I'm living in an area where the SCA is starting back up after being dormant for a lot of years. I had spoken to a few of the members, some of who had played elsewhere and knew some of the people I had known back in the day. For some folks, things never change apparently.
I had started poking around to see what I could find out concerning overturning my banishment. Let me tell you, the SCA is very secretive about a lot of things...including the information that short of murder it is impossible for banishment to be truly permanent, as even banishments handed out for the reason mine was last fifteen years at the most. Not to mention that apparently there is no record of my banishment or even the reason I was banished for. Oh, and apparently my Award of Arms wasn't recorded, even though I have the physical proof of it. The local seneschal for the group I'm with now is looking into that for me - she is also the one that gave me the information about my banishment expiring after fifteen years.
So, I'm back to doing SCA stuff. Once I can afford it, I will get a paid membership once again, and go from there. I have some ideas in my head for garb, both fighting and off the field, and I have plans on setting up some sort of shire library.
I will admit that I have been a bit nervous about jumping back into the SCA, especially after my last go round with it, but I know that the people here are different. No egos the sizes of any that I'd dealt with my previous go. And it's a different kingdom, and a smaller population here, so my fingers are crossed that things don't go entirely to hell. Mind you, I'm also staying the hell out of the politics while I'm at it. I just want to go out there and have some fun again.
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