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Recent News... Just for Pope Gregory... |
2003-01-29 - 7:16 p.m. Grey Blurs in the Black and White Cold. Grey sky. Snow. Cold. Office is so chilly I am still wrapped in my scarf. Why did I give Lan back that stylish, soft, olive green scarf he abandoned in my truck this weekend? It would've gone so perfectly with this outfit. Dame Anne asked about fealty, and I sent her this answer. Fealty is doing what is right, not what is easy. Is it easy to keep your commitments when your life is too busy? Is it easy to comport yourself as a Peer when you are tired and irritated? Is it easy to support the Crown unswervingly? No. When I gave fealty, I promised to uphold certain ideals, to give good counsel, to offer my service to Crown and Kingdom. This support is not given unreserved. Oh, no. It is my duty to express my objections and doubts to the Crown. It is Their duty to listen. And after, it is my duty to either support Their actions or break fealty. And I mean that literally. In the Middle Ages, if you could not uphold your end of the fealty contract, you should ask to be released from service. What is right? What is worthwhile service? And when is that contract broken? And how does this simple formula apply to the myriad fealty relationships amongst us? What binds us to keep fealty save our honor? The answers will be written situation to situation over my lifetime and yours. Fealty is far harder and far more rewarding than I ever thought it would be. Privileges are always accompanied by obligations. Everyone interested in the price of fealty should read or watch El Cid, because humans always illustrate their values best in story and song. I always cry through the movie. I always hope I can be that brave. Ask yourself, why do the same myths persist through the ages of our history? The Arthurian legends stretch back to the 8th century, perhaps earlier. Check the local library � there are many retellings of that legend. Why? Because we need heroes. Poignancy and passion; sacrifice and truth; evil vanquished. The epics allow us to touch something greater than ourselves. Heroes are ordinary people rising to extraordinary situations. The NYC Fire Department. The airline passengers who rushed the hijackers, refusing to let their deaths be meaningless. The gallant Crimean soldiers of the Light Brigade. Heroes are those who simply refused to stand silently and watch evil flourish anymore. Martin Luther. Rosa Parks. Martin Luther King, Jr. Gandhi. Heroes are people who work slowly and steadily, in their quiet, unapplauded ways, to make this a better world. The coaches, teachers, medical researchers. The parents put aside their own needs for their children. The cashier in my cafeteria who always gives you a smile and a song along with your change. Heroes enrich the human race through their sacrifices, both large and small. They make us believe in the good. Perhaps the SCA is, in many ways, a venue where we seek opportunities to rise beyond the mundanity of our everyday lives, to find an extraordinary situation. Even if we fall short, simply the struggle for ideals makes a worthy conversation. I wish Q would get here. Once we clear that stuff out the basement, I get Indian food. I must remember to say thank you to the singing lunch lady who shares my name. Ideals and the worth of sacrifice seem to preoccupy my mind these days; in the days before our leaders will choose whether to commit this country to war. I think the same questions apply: Is it easy to stay informed, to make your voice heard when your life is so busy? Is it easy to be mindful of the wider world when you are so tired and irritated? Is it easy to support your leaders? Trust your leaders? What about the people, just like me and you, who are somewhere on a street in Iraq just trying to get home from a long day to cook dinner for their family? What about the soliders on both sides who will have to stand on the wall? My dad said today he favored the �Kill them all; let God sort them out� because once you commit yourself to urban warfare, you can no longer identify your enemy. The smiling ten year old boy, may have a pistol behind his back. How much easier the epic sagas, where the world is black and white and all the sacrifices are on paper. � � � 
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