[Ansteorra] Conversation starter...

[Stefan li Rous]

On May 14, 2012, at 8:44 PM, Chris Zakes wrote:

> At 04:28 PM 5/14/2012, you wrote:
>
>>  How did you get involved in the SCA?
>
> I first met the SCA over the point of a sword. Literally.
>
> This was in March of 1975; my residential college at Rice University  
> in Houston was having its annual Shakespeare Fair, and ...

Had things worked out differently, that was about when I should have  
joined the SCA. For that was when I first ran into the SCA. There was  
a acquaintance on  my Science/Engineering floor of Jester Dorm at UT  
who talked about this thing called the SCA. Bright red hair by the  
mundane name of Rick. I've long lost contact with him, in case anyone  
remembers him.

Some years later another friend of mine and I went down to the  
Halloween bash on Austin's 6th Street. He in his mail shirt of  
galvanized steel, and me in his older shirt of aluminum mail. I also  
know now, why *I* got the aluminum mail. That oxide rubs off on  
*everything*. He told me about the SCA and encouraged me to come out  
to a fighter practice.  That he'd help me get into some armor and let  
me see how I liked it. But I didn't.

Another couple of years go by, and in the fall of 1988, I went with a  
couple of friends to the Texas Renaissance Fair in Magnolia, TX. While  
their I signed up on the information sheet at the SCA booth. One the  
way home I talked to a pair of my friends, Kim and Paul Schrueders  
(Nina of the Lost Caverns and Demitre) about the SCA and I decided I  
needed to be less of a hermit socially and they made a few calls when  
we got back into town and confirmed that fighter practice was still  
being done on Sunday afternoons in Waterloo Park.  That next Sunday,  
or maybe the one after that I showed up at the park and started playing.

Early that spring, I joined several SCA newsgroups and started saving  
bits and pieces of information that I thought I or others might find  
useful in the future. 22 years later those couple of pages of notes  
have grown into the Florilegium website.

Before I joined the SCA, I don't think I owned any books on medieval  
subjects. Now there are bookcases of such books in almost every room  
of the house.

There can never be too many books but there can definitely be too few  
bookcases.
And too little time to read them all.:-(

Stefan

--------
THLord Stefan li Rous    Barony of Bryn Gwlad    Kingdom of Ansteorra
    Mark S. Harris           Austin, Texas          StefanliRous at austin.rr.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/marksharris
**** See Stefan's Florilegium files at:  http://www.florilegium.org ****