SC - Fwd: Article from the globeandmail.com Web Centre

Tue Jan 18 00:38:33 PST 2000

Someone on the SCA-Caid list found this article and
brought our attention to it.  Because it is from
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, I thought I would pass it
on to here, 1) so that someone from that area might
look into this; and 2) because it does refer to an SCA
banquet.

It has brought up some lively discuss on the SCA-Caid
list, as I am sure it will do so here.

Huette

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

> The Globe and Mail, Friday, January 14, 2000
> 
> Three stooges visit the Middle Ages
>   For grownups, having fun is harder than it seems
> By Jan Melnyk
> 
> 
>  Easy as child's play, we say. What an oxymoron.
> Child's play is hardly easy to replicate, my husband
> and I discovered at a gathering of so-called playful
> adults one weekend last fall.
> 
> Saturday seemed like a banner day in our rather
> play-challenged lives, where play runs the gamut
> from tallying a hand of pinochle to sparring with
> the dog and the vacuum cleaner.
> 
> When we were invited to a medieval tournament, I was
> thrilled. To play dress-up and be a kid again! What
> a lark. My husband, Mike, was not so enthusiastic
> but agreed to come along. His eyes lit up a little
> when I mentioned the four-meal feast.
> 
> The woman who asked us to join the festivities
> kindly offered to assist with our costumes.
> 
> "What did they wear in those times?" I asked
> innocently.
> 
> "What medieval movies have you seen?"
> 
> "Spartacus?" I ventured.
> 
> "Spartacus?" she choked. "That's Roman."
> 
> I felt like the Grade 3 kid who gives the
> oh-so-wrong answer.
> 
> "Robin Hood?" I tried again.
> 
> This time, I got the nod. Soon, my spouse and I were
> decked out in medieval attire, he as Friar Mike and
> me as an androgynous Robin Hood.
> 
> I asked whether my rather macho mate had to wear
> tights. He had tanned legs and, since it was still
> warmish out, perhaps he could go barelegged. Tell
> him to wear a pair of black pants, I was told.
> Footwear for the occasion? No running shoes, I was
> told. And so the games began. Or rather the rules.
> 
> We set out, me in my green booty bedroom slippers
> and Mike already flouting the rules with bare legs
> under his tunic. We picked up a friend from my
> workplace who gave herself the moniker Tess for the
> day. She was the quintessential beggar, her dirty
> hair flattened on her head, her face dusted with
> soot. Even some of her teeth were blackened with
> theatrical paint, giving her a rather toothless
> effect.
> 
> It was a perfect fall day in the Alberta countryside
> as we arrived at the community hall. A combine was
> chugging along in the distance, kicking up the dust
> behind it.
> 
> We joined a throng at the baseball diamond afoot
> with action. A tournament of sorts. The players were
> facing off with sticks covered with duct tape.
> Hockey, you ask? Not with this crowd. Serious sword
> fighting it was. We watched the ladies kiss their
> knights goodbye before they set off to duel.
> 
> My husband expressed delight when the referee called
> out "Lay-on!" to begin a match. "It's like street
> hockey," Mike explained. "Game on!" he called out
> gleefully, expecting to join in the festive
> atmosphere. An icy feeling ensued.
> 
> Baronesses and barons, jesters and jousters, were
> decked out in resplendent purples, reds and yellows
> to rival the splendour of the fall trees. I wondered
> whether our nearby farmer knew what manner of motley
> crew filled the distant bleachers as he went about
> his harvesting.
> 
> We three peasants did try to fit in rather than
> stand out.
> 
> I melted into the throng of spectators watching Eric
> the Trespasser, kind of a shortish lion-maned Darth
> Vader battle Haiti the Wonder Viking. A Jack Russell
> terrier went ballistic in the stands.
> 
> My friar husband and Tess the wench decided to
> mingle with the masses. They found a cavalier off
> doing some needlework by himself. Friar Mike, trying
> to be friendly, asked the feather-hatted crafter
> whether he was cross-stitching.
> 
> "How ever would I do something so crude?" the man
> said, not even looking up from his petit point. My
> mate, not versed in the sewing arts, felt snubbed
> and stomped off.
> 
> Tess, growing weary of the endless hours of jousting
> and fencing, wandered into the hall to check out the
> merchants' wares. She started a conversation with
> one silvermonger. He answered her curtly and turned
> away to serve a more buxom customer. She asked
> another question, whereupon he again dismissed her
> with this chatty remark: "I have already said one
> thing to you."
> 
> At this point, we three decided we were not having
> fun. Tess hoped there would be storytelling. Mike
> hoped for tables loaded with food. I hoped there
> would be a prevailing spirit of comradeship.
> 
> There was camaraderie; just not with us. You had to
> belong and fit in and know what to do. We felt like
> the Three Stooges parachuted into the Medieval Ages.
> 
> There were too many rules. Children don't play this
> way, I thought. If I were a child, I would be
> innovating with my role as Robin Hood, perhaps doing
> a mock curtsy at the nobility, sticking out my
> tongue instead of bowing to them. But in this
> medieval society, protocol reigned. We weren't free
> to make up the rules as we went along.
> 
> At the feast, we took in the pretentiousness that
> participants wore as they kissed their ladies' hands
> and knelt in the royal court to receive their
> scrolls and accolades. "These people are playing for
> keeps," Tess said.
> 
> What if Robin Hood were to start a food fight, I
> wondered, totally bored with the feast fixins'.
> 
> We nibbled on two skimpy "removes," as they were
> called in medievalspeak, the meals lorded over with
> the pomp and circumstance of the royalty perched in
> their thrones.
> 
> A haggis bastard here, a carrot stick there. The
> tansy cakes were scooped up before I blinked.
> 
> We couldn't even fill our emptiness with comfort
> food. At midnight, we left, fatigued, famished and
> with unfulfilled fantasies.
> 
> Is play a lost art? Not as long as children roam the
> Earth. We would do well to watch them. But we can't
> seem to regain the ability to play once we have
> vanished into adulthood. Or maybe we have learned a
> new skill called "not playing."
> 
> Easy as child's play? Easy for them, but not for
> most of us.
> 
> I realize I have left childhood in my slipstream. I
> have put my Robin Hood garments aside. And now all I
> can do is gaze out the window as the neighbourhood
> kids pretend for hours upon hours, creating the
> imaginary worlds they live in. 
> 
>       
> 
>     Jan Melnyk is an Edmonton writer.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Copyright 1999 The Globe and Mail
> 
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