At Beltane, on Friday night I phoned it in… hard.
We set up camp, headed off site for dinner, returned to site, put the child to bed and then I decided I wanted to spend a little while sitting by the fire.
This last year I lost 65 lbs and gave away most of my dresses. I currently own two dresses which I can wear after I put on my underkirtle. Beltane is two days long. So I planned to wear both of my dresses. I didn’t want to strip down and re-dress in my underkirtle just so I could wear (and potentially dirty) one of the two dresses I needed to wear that weekend. So instead I asked my husband if I could borrow one of his tunics to “just throw on”.
I sat by the fire for a bit.. but then I got cold so I threw on the only coat I had with me, my 16th c. red wool Flemish jacket. It still has pins on it where I’m trying to attach the facing.. and I haven’t yet finished putting the hook/eye on the front edge.. so currently there’s now way to close the front. So I sat there, by the fire, in my own camp, with a much-too-big-for-me 10th century tunic thrown on over white tennis shoes, jeans and a t-shirt and a red 16th century jacket over it all. To top it off I put on a fuzzy wool hat to keep my head warm. In short.. I was a hot medieval-oid mess.
SCA Corpora says you have to “make an attempt at pre-16th century clothing”. This was (however weak) an attempt.
When I told this story to a group of friends my apprentice asked if I at least hid my Laurel medallion. I specifically hadn’t put it on. I knew when this was happening that I was phoning it in. I knew that my level of garb was okay as far as Corpora. I knew the garb police were not going to hunt me down and take away my medallion.
At the same time.. I knew I should do better. Not necessarily because I am a Laurel.. but because I do better. I get to choose where my bar is.. and I knew I was not meeting the bar I had set.
I will not try to tell others where they should set their bar.. and I will try not to judge others for how they meet or don’t meet my bar.. but I definitely get to set/reach my bar… and I will do better.
This also reminded me that I need the project “make clothes for myself and my family” to have a much higher priority.