I Guess This is Why I Took the Job

I love doing Art & Science stuff in the Society of Creative Anachronism… perhaps I should say –  I love doing the A&S things that I love doing, in the SCA. The fields that come under the A&S arch are so many that arch would stretch for miles. I am trying to branch out and get more experience in more fields – the embroidery I’m tackling being the latest – but even if I lived to a hundred, I’d never get a chance to try them all.

Because the scope is so broad, and because the interests so varied, inevitable there are some fields that just are not as immediately understandable – or don’t have the ‘WoW!’ factor that say a shiny brooch does. Since the SCA is a social group, sure we are about research, creating, and many many other things, but there is a reason we meet and have events – it’s because we are a social club in most aspects. Otherwise, we would simply do it all online. So if you are going to and participating in this social club, and your thing is A&S ,and your A&S thing is obscure and hard to ‘hands on’ do during an event… who knows you are doing it? Who sees you working and sits down to talk about it? Who is your clique if everyone is embroidering and your interest is herbalism?

This is true of any social setting, church group, school, work , even home life. It can be very isolating to not have that group that nods and chatters excitedly. It sets you outside, even if you force yourself to participate in what others talking about. If you don’t like sports but everyone at work is talking of the game last night, you either watch the game to join in – even though you hate it – or you don’t join in and people stop inviting you to do things.

As Baronial officer, I have had this realization, I didn’t have when I was just doing my own projects. I could simply ignore the issue, as it’s not really my job to make sure everyone has a clique with-in the game. I could force everyone to stop and pay attention to the excluded one, but that doesn’t include them – it only further alienates them. What I can do, is listen. I can find common ground, and I can see if there is a connection in what they do to what others do, even if it’s not the same.

Stopping the feeling of isolation isn’t about forcing one group or another to interact, it about letting someone know that you are aware they are there and that their choices are valid and worth while. So I’m going to educate myself as much as I can. I’m going to interact as much as I can. Most importantly , I’m going to what is with-in my power to make sure people don’t get disappointed, and bitter, towards the thing they love – the A&S field of their choice. And hopefully that will help them stay active and happy in this social club. I can’t fix all the problems that individuals might perceive – but I can try to nudge the real issues out of the way some.

Filed under: SCA