[Steppes] Steppes Seneschal Announcement

[Steppes Seneschal]

The soon to be Steppes Seneschal, the Honorable Lady Margarite McBridin.  It
has a nice ring to it.

It sounds like a simple job.  Go to some meetings, sign some papers, decide
what to do on event related topics.  They are all simple things on the
surface.  The main complication are not the items I listed, but the people
involved in the situations themselves.   Someone will read an email that
conveys an unintended offensive tone.  Due to stress, an conversation might
be more abrupt or curt than one person felt appropriate.  Then there is my
favorite, the rumor.  Wait, let me take that back, my true favorite
complication machine is the inflated repeated story, as in a 'paper cut'
100 repeats later becomes a 'broken leg'.

Going forward, please consider these things.

If you receive an email that angers you, before forwarding to anyone, reply
to the sender with "gee, that email sounded kind of mean, or did I miss read
it?"

At an event, take an assessment of the person you are about to speak to.
Are they already having 12 conversations?  Could yours wait a moment?  Have
you ever thought of approaching them with cookies in hand?  All things snap
under enough pressure, so go easy on them.

If you hear a story of something odd or bad going on that just makes you
want to run off and warn your 10 best friends... don't.  Inspect the story.
Inspect the source,   Inspect the situation.  We waste time and hurt people
by reacting to these stories.  It fractures us as a group, and serves no
good.

Take your humility and humble pills daily, and after every meal at events.

We are a large group with many diverse backgrounds and we really don't know
each other that well.  We need to learn to correct minor misunderstandings.
If we did, these issues would fall part.

Please help my successor.  She is a far better person than I am, and being a
mother, has acquired far more patience than I ever could.

Respect her, assist her, and defend her.  You as a group can make make her
time in office go well, or make her wish that she never took the job.  I
respect all of you, and expect you to choose the first option, not the
latter.





Jon Rolfsson
Steppes Seneschal (for the moment)