Twelfth Night 2005
Jan. 16th, 2005 02:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jamesqIt had it's ups and downs.
The day started OK. I had a decent enough sleep after practicing some archery the night before. The weather has improved to the point where -18 actually felt good. Gareth, Kirin and I went to the Calgary Archery Centre early for the tournament. Garething did remarkably well. Me, not so much.
Now long time readers of my blatherings will know that I have a sort of love/hate relationship with 12th night. I do well enough at minor events like tavern. The weekly archery practice and post-practice Brewster's chat I'm pretty comfortable with. Non-SCA get togethers I'm fine with, even if the party in question is chock full of SCAdians.
Part of the problem I think is that 12th night exaggerates the cliquish nature of the SCA. It's such a huge event that they only way to go to it is as part of a group. You get together with your friends and stake out a table. You decide as a group whether your going to partake in the provided feast or not. You have a place you're guaranteed to be a part of. For my part, I was part of a table and I did at least have a place where I could go and not feel like a wall flower.
The other problem is that, in a social atmosphere, you get four kinds of people, divided on an axis of charisma/non-charisma and another axis of attractive/non-attractive. Let me back up a minute and define my terms here. I mean charismatic as in whether you feel comfortable walking up to a total stranger and talking to them. I mean attractiveness to be literally how well you attract total strangers to talk to you (and non-attractive is not synonymous with unattractive - these people aren't necessarily ugly, they just don't stand out in a crowd).
For a charismatic and attractive person, the world is their oyster. 12th night is their element - 200 people with common interests, you can troll around the room guaranteed to have a good time meeting people. In the SCA, attractiveness doesn't always equate with good looks. You could have some SCA specific talent, or just look really good in garb. But you stand out, and people can and do introduce themselves to you.
Charismatic/non-attractive people are much the same. They can and do walk up and meet people.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
garething falls into this category and he made the most of it, barely spending any time at our table, instead opting to go out and talk to everyone. He shows up at half the events I do, and he knows three times as many people. God I envy him.
Non-charismatic people yet attractive people also have it pretty good. They are like a beacon that says "come and meet me". They can be shy but it doesn't matter, they still meet people. The charismatic people come to them.
Finally there is the non-charismatic, non-attractive people. This would include me. I have nothing that makes people want to talk to me (hell, my biggest SCA-related talent is archery and on my good days, I'm an OK shot. The rest of the time I suck). Groups of people talking to each other are closed to me, a constant reminder of my wallflower nature. An event like 12th night accentuates this - it becomes a long evening of dull depression, broken up by the occasional sense of up when I actually do get into a decent conversation with someone.
I hate it. I hate not being able to talk to people. When I do manage to talk, I will as often as not stick my foot in my mouth. It's like I'm wearing a cloak of invisibility. On rare occasions the cloak will whip off to reveal that I'm wearing a blood-soaked clown suit. That both outfits are involuntary doesn't really matter - I still come off as the quiet guy who buries dead hookers in his garage. People who like me (and I do have friends, despite what you might gather from the last couple of paragraphs) do so only because they've taken the effort to see past their first impressions of me and their second impressions too. They will often times forget those early impressions. When I hear them ask things like "how come you aren't dating", then I know they've forgotten.
Now 12th night has been getting better. I do know a few people more every year, and being peripherally involved with some of the local nobility has helped me meet a few more. At this rate I'll be having a full evening on 12th night 2012.
I was more-or-less enjoying myself right up until the time Wendy gave me the cloven fruit.
Now you can do one of two things with the fruit (assuming you accept it) - you can give it to someone you know (the safe thing) or you can give it to a stranger you'd like to meet. Well my therapist has been trying to get me to work past my social phobia, so I opted to go with the door number two.
There is this girl in the SCA that I find attractive. Some friend of mine have made a point of describing her in glowing terms guaranteed to make me interested (single, well educated, movie aficionado, role-playing gamer).
Then I noticed her talking to my friend Jacqui! This was the second most ideal situation for a cloven fruit hand-off - she was with someone who would respond positively to my presence! So I made my way over, said Hi and offered her the fruit.
She looked at it, looked at me, and for a split second I saw abject horror and revulsion flash across her eyes. She caught herself and the look was quickly replaced with a mask of civility. Needless to say I was rejected. I made a swift departure and made an effort to keep as far away from Madame X as I could (lest she think I was stalking her) for the rest of the evening.
So yeah, I had the cloven fruit, and I was in a venue where passing it around was socially acceptable. However I forgot that I'm a huge looming figure of extreme creepiness. The fact that I was wearing a cloak and she was wearing a corset and we both said milord and milady doesn't change that overwhelming reality of my life. Yet another woman I've passed the creep threshold with.
At this point I was seriously considering just chucking the damn thing onto the roof and silently cursing the name of the guy (I'm pretty sure it was a guy) who opted to stick three dozen cloves into an orange and make the rest of us miserable just because he wanted to chat up some girl. No, I thought, give it to someone who will appreciate a positive gesture, needs a pick-me-up, already knows and likes me, and has someone they can pass it off to themselves without danger. I gave it to Z, who thanked and hugged me. no creep threshold crossed.
Why is this game still being played? Better than half the women I talked to about this after the fact were adamant about never accepting a cloven fruit, even from their mates. They considered it a game fraught with frustration and rejection that had the added danger of putting them in uncomfortable position of being with guys who don't understand that the game has limits. More than one told me about fruit exchanges that included unwelcome frenching. I like a little tongue dueling as much as the next guy, but I sure as hell don't do it unless I know the lady in question really well.
So next time I get offered the cloven fruit, I will politely thank the lady for her flattering interest in me, but decline it because I don't want to have to give it to someone else.
I laughed, I cried, it's slowly getting better each year, but I could do without the blows to my self-esteem.
The day started OK. I had a decent enough sleep after practicing some archery the night before. The weather has improved to the point where -18 actually felt good. Gareth, Kirin and I went to the Calgary Archery Centre early for the tournament. Garething did remarkably well. Me, not so much.
Now long time readers of my blatherings will know that I have a sort of love/hate relationship with 12th night. I do well enough at minor events like tavern. The weekly archery practice and post-practice Brewster's chat I'm pretty comfortable with. Non-SCA get togethers I'm fine with, even if the party in question is chock full of SCAdians.
Part of the problem I think is that 12th night exaggerates the cliquish nature of the SCA. It's such a huge event that they only way to go to it is as part of a group. You get together with your friends and stake out a table. You decide as a group whether your going to partake in the provided feast or not. You have a place you're guaranteed to be a part of. For my part, I was part of a table and I did at least have a place where I could go and not feel like a wall flower.
The other problem is that, in a social atmosphere, you get four kinds of people, divided on an axis of charisma/non-charisma and another axis of attractive/non-attractive. Let me back up a minute and define my terms here. I mean charismatic as in whether you feel comfortable walking up to a total stranger and talking to them. I mean attractiveness to be literally how well you attract total strangers to talk to you (and non-attractive is not synonymous with unattractive - these people aren't necessarily ugly, they just don't stand out in a crowd).
For a charismatic and attractive person, the world is their oyster. 12th night is their element - 200 people with common interests, you can troll around the room guaranteed to have a good time meeting people. In the SCA, attractiveness doesn't always equate with good looks. You could have some SCA specific talent, or just look really good in garb. But you stand out, and people can and do introduce themselves to you.
Charismatic/non-attractive people are much the same. They can and do walk up and meet people.
garething falls into this category and he made the most of it, barely spending any time at our table, instead opting to go out and talk to everyone. He shows up at half the events I do, and he knows three times as many people. God I envy him.Non-charismatic people yet attractive people also have it pretty good. They are like a beacon that says "come and meet me". They can be shy but it doesn't matter, they still meet people. The charismatic people come to them.
Finally there is the non-charismatic, non-attractive people. This would include me. I have nothing that makes people want to talk to me (hell, my biggest SCA-related talent is archery and on my good days, I'm an OK shot. The rest of the time I suck). Groups of people talking to each other are closed to me, a constant reminder of my wallflower nature. An event like 12th night accentuates this - it becomes a long evening of dull depression, broken up by the occasional sense of up when I actually do get into a decent conversation with someone.
I hate it. I hate not being able to talk to people. When I do manage to talk, I will as often as not stick my foot in my mouth. It's like I'm wearing a cloak of invisibility. On rare occasions the cloak will whip off to reveal that I'm wearing a blood-soaked clown suit. That both outfits are involuntary doesn't really matter - I still come off as the quiet guy who buries dead hookers in his garage. People who like me (and I do have friends, despite what you might gather from the last couple of paragraphs) do so only because they've taken the effort to see past their first impressions of me and their second impressions too. They will often times forget those early impressions. When I hear them ask things like "how come you aren't dating", then I know they've forgotten.
Now 12th night has been getting better. I do know a few people more every year, and being peripherally involved with some of the local nobility has helped me meet a few more. At this rate I'll be having a full evening on 12th night 2012.
I was more-or-less enjoying myself right up until the time Wendy gave me the cloven fruit.
Now you can do one of two things with the fruit (assuming you accept it) - you can give it to someone you know (the safe thing) or you can give it to a stranger you'd like to meet. Well my therapist has been trying to get me to work past my social phobia, so I opted to go with the door number two.
There is this girl in the SCA that I find attractive. Some friend of mine have made a point of describing her in glowing terms guaranteed to make me interested (single, well educated, movie aficionado, role-playing gamer).
Ryan: Madame X is over there, why don't you offer the fruit to her.Naturally I went over it in glowing terms of what's the worst thing that can happen. I have a vivid imagination when it comes to what's the worst thing that can happen.
Me: Let me think about that for a bit.
Then I noticed her talking to my friend Jacqui! This was the second most ideal situation for a cloven fruit hand-off - she was with someone who would respond positively to my presence! So I made my way over, said Hi and offered her the fruit.
She looked at it, looked at me, and for a split second I saw abject horror and revulsion flash across her eyes. She caught herself and the look was quickly replaced with a mask of civility. Needless to say I was rejected. I made a swift departure and made an effort to keep as far away from Madame X as I could (lest she think I was stalking her) for the rest of the evening.
So yeah, I had the cloven fruit, and I was in a venue where passing it around was socially acceptable. However I forgot that I'm a huge looming figure of extreme creepiness. The fact that I was wearing a cloak and she was wearing a corset and we both said milord and milady doesn't change that overwhelming reality of my life. Yet another woman I've passed the creep threshold with.
At this point I was seriously considering just chucking the damn thing onto the roof and silently cursing the name of the guy (I'm pretty sure it was a guy) who opted to stick three dozen cloves into an orange and make the rest of us miserable just because he wanted to chat up some girl. No, I thought, give it to someone who will appreciate a positive gesture, needs a pick-me-up, already knows and likes me, and has someone they can pass it off to themselves without danger. I gave it to Z, who thanked and hugged me. no creep threshold crossed.
Why is this game still being played? Better than half the women I talked to about this after the fact were adamant about never accepting a cloven fruit, even from their mates. They considered it a game fraught with frustration and rejection that had the added danger of putting them in uncomfortable position of being with guys who don't understand that the game has limits. More than one told me about fruit exchanges that included unwelcome frenching. I like a little tongue dueling as much as the next guy, but I sure as hell don't do it unless I know the lady in question really well.
So next time I get offered the cloven fruit, I will politely thank the lady for her flattering interest in me, but decline it because I don't want to have to give it to someone else.
I laughed, I cried, it's slowly getting better each year, but I could do without the blows to my self-esteem.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-01-16 01:41 pm (UTC)If she's anything at all like me (most people aren't, but that's another story), maybe she panicked at being handed the damned thing, and her look was one of generic ohmygodwhatdoIdonowpanic. Because for me it wouldn't matter who handed it to me (most likely they wouldn't, but if they did), I would be totally freaked out by the implicit social burden that comes along with it.
It would be funny if some time someone took a big old Thor hammer and smashed the damned thing flat. That would put paid to all that nonsense. ;)
no subject
Date: 2005-01-16 01:56 pm (UTC)It's just, well, I've seen the look before, without the benefit of a decorated orange to blame it on. Placed in that oh shit, I messed up again situation, any critical thinking skills I have go out the window.
C Fruit
Date: 2005-01-16 06:12 pm (UTC)One gentleman gave me a fruit in a very engaging and non-threatening way. He approached me while I was in a conversation, swept my hand to his lips (a chase kiss on the top), plopped the orange in my open hand and wandered off. It gave me a smile all night.
Re: C Fruit
Date: 2005-01-16 06:13 pm (UTC)*grin*
no subject
Date: 2005-01-19 07:48 pm (UTC)Wendy tells me it's usually women who start these things rolling.