Princess Patrol
"Are you on Princess Patrol, today?"
The woman asking the question is Mistress Thora Sharptooth, a Norsewoman honored for her skill at the arts and sciences, who looks like she just stepped out of a shop in the marketplace at Yorvík. Or she's Carolyn Priest-Dorman, wife to a Vassar College professor, volunteer in the college's Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center, and inveterate researcher.
I'm Stephanie Ryan, arts editor of the Banner. Or else, today, I'm Lady Muirgheall O'Riein, a Scottish resident of Dublin, Ireland just after the reign of Brian Boru, co-leader with my Norse-Irish husband of my clan and, until at least next May, retainer to her Royal Highness Alethea Eastriding, current crown princess and soon-to-be queen of the Kingdom of the East in the Society for Creative Anachronism.
Welcome to the Pennsic War.
As it happens, when I meet with Mistress Thora, I'm just out and about at Pennsic with my clan-brother, not on duty at all. We're roaming the shops and stopping at the Moroccan coffeehouse, buying gifts for family and peering across the road to the battlefield, where my husband is indistingushable from the thousand other armored souls bent on "killing" one another with a minimum of actual injury.
Thora, as it happens, has been much more involved with the "political" aspects of our shared hobby than I have, over the years, so she fully understands what I have been learning, these past few months: retaining is a heck of a lot of fun.
Pennsic is an annual gathering of medieval re-enactors, held in western Pennsylvania every year. It's formatted as a war between two kingdoms, though there's a lot more going on than fighting, fencing and archery. There are classes and games, shopping and courts, parties and theater, concerts and dancing -- too much and too many for any one person to hope to see it all.
I started my tenure as an attendant to Princess Alethea this past May, shortly after Duke Darius, so titled because he has been king twice before, became Prince Darius again, and made her his consort. I've already got the basics down: Make sure Her Highness' bag contains a notebook, pen, snacks, water. Keep track of the bag, her mug, and where she needs to be next, and help her to stay on schedule. Backstop her so she isn't overwhelmed by people who want to hobnob when she needs to visit the privy. Best of all, stand behind her during court, where you have the best possible view, and can hear everything that's going on.
All of that gets stepped up, at the War. There are between 10,000 and 12,000 people here. Opening Ceremonies involve a processional march in full gear, singing as you go. Watching the royalty of the 17 kingdoms worldwide marching in, some with guards and others with stiltwalkers, followed by the Great Dark Horde, and then hearing the speeches from right up close is a part of Pennsic I'd never experienced before -- and I've been attending, off and on (mostly on) for 19 years. As it happened, as our procession approached the battlefield, we met up with the procession of the Midrealm, our traditional opponents. Instead of making for the castle, we marched toward one another until we met, then spun in formation as if we'd rehearsed it, and marched the last few hundred yards together. ALL of us singing. Magical.
And the magical moments continued. I saw a man knighted, right on the battlefield. Woke in the early pre-dawn fog and watched it burn off as the sun rose. Hung onto her Highness' coronet and her water bottle as she fought the rapier woods battle, fire in her eyes and an inspirational speech on her tongue. Listened to drums in the distance. Watched as problems were aired, and solved. Walked off a few pounds. Polished coronets and spun yarn while listening and learning more about how my game is played.
This year, I shared, as always, in the spell that transforms an editor into a bard, a contractor into a squire, a seamstress into a merchant, a computer geek into a wandering Russian philosopher, a social worker into a warrior, a teacher into a Samurai, a librarian into a princess, and the mundane, modern world into a place where firelight flickers, noble kings honor their worthy subjects, stories are told and songs sung ... and saw it all anew, from behind the throne, in a way that will enrich my experience of my lifelong hobby in ways I'd never have imagined.