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As evidence of my further descent into Renniedom, I went to a faire further than a normal commute from my hometown for the first time. I drove 250 miles from Lawrence, KS, to Muskogee to attend the Oklahoma Renaissance Faire. The intervening week offered a regional Rainbow Gathering in the Oachita Mountains about 120 miles further to the south, so I was able to easily come back for a second weekend.

The weather on both of the two weekends I was there (May 11-12 and 18-19) was near perfect, temperatures no higher than the mid-80's the first, mid-60's the second. It wasn't until about 4:30 the first Sunday that a very feelable cold front ripped thru dropping a gullywasher, otherwise there was no rain.

My second faire I naturally perceived mostly in relation to my first, the Kansas City Renaissance Festival. It seemed about a third as big, in terms of numbers of people, size of grounds, and numbers of shops and booths (however comparing them on the "Directorie of Renasissance Faires" site suggests more like a half).

It had a few acts that I had seen at KCRF. Bob the Juggler was there, standing on the big ball bullwhipping off the end of a styrofoam stick being held in the mouth of a giggling and terrified woman, his act unchanged from KC. Terry Elton the magician was there too, but with a lot of new tricks. There was a flock of predatory birds and their handlers, but a different group of people. There was of course a joust, not much different from KC, and the Okie Faire, like KC, had a Henry VIII and a Robin Hood.

I showed up the first day an hour before opening time as I had learned to do at KCRF, so that I wouldn't have to park my car a long march away from the gate. I continued to do so the other days, tho it wasn't as critically necessary, for the parking lot was much more compact. They also had a stamp your hand reentry policy, so I was again able to unload purchases into my van during the day and partake of water and sodas that cost less than 2 dollars from my ice chest.

The grounds extended from a main building, The Castle of Muskogee, which was also used for events other than Faire thruout the year. It was what was really a steel frame building, about skating rink size, with walls out of modern cinder blocks around the outside, with crenellated tops and several round towers. The exterior was painted in a gray and black stone masonry pattern, very obviously paint, and I first thought it was a little tacky and tourist-trappy looking. But it had some inner beauty. The interior was air-conditioned, and the privies inside had running water and mostly remained in a state resembling cleanliness. I was able to easily refill my water jug for free.

There was a warmup act in front of the gate before opening time, and it was different every time. It basically involved the King and Queen (Margaret of Scotland) coming in a carriage, with some bagpipers also arriving, and His Majesty then chastising assorted unfortunates in the assembled cast - but the dialog was different every time, and looked mostly improvised. This seemed mostly the rule thruout the faire. The King walked about among the patrons all day, talking with anyone who wanted to play, and so did most of the rest of the cast. There wasn't a set story with several scenes, repeated daily, as there was at KCRF.

The King was played by John Auld, the same man who had played Friar Tuck at KCRF, and he took the stern admonishing manner in which he had told patrons at KC to get out of the street to make way for the parade and developed it into utter imperiousness as His Majesty. He filled the role as well as he did his huge doublet.

The spontaneity was also observed in the musicians. There were a few large stages, two inside the castle in a pub and a ballroom, but the musicians who did only performed one or two sets a day on them. Mostly they were heard playing by food stands, or strolling in the street.

As at KC there was a combined jam of musicians from several different bands assembling just inside the gate after it opened, to which I was immediately drawn on the first day. There I immediately encountered Bruce the Bruce with his guitar and kilt, tho he had to introduce himself because I did not recognize him in the beard that he had grown since I saw him last. After the music died down, he offered to show me around, and he introduced me to several people whose names I as usual immediately forgot. He praised my prose profusely to several of those he introduced me too, and that is why he's getting this long missive in return.

I strolled after him as he sang Gypsy Rover ..."he whistled and he sang 'til the green woods rang, and he won the heart of a la-a-a-dy" This song came up in many other places thruout the faire, to the point that it became a theme song for it to me. He would go up to man and woman couples and inform them that a lady on the left is no lady at all, and show them the proper way to hold hands as they promenaded together (forearms over each other, raised slightly out and parallel to the ground).

One of his lady friends dropped and laid herself out on the ground, on her back looking up, and swooned out, "Scottish crossing!" Bruce ultimately obliged and stepped over her, but she held her eyes closed in a wincing frown while her mouth was trying to keep from breaking out laughing.

There were lots of kilts on the playtrons, lots of cavalier and pirate outfits, lots of gypsies, a noticeable number of filmy butterfly wings on the backs of fairies. I had on the lavender chemise, blue skirt, and pink flowery bodice that I had bought last year at KC, and got compliments constantly.

This became the answer to the FAQ about why I was wearing a dress: "I get lots of compliments that I wouldn't get otherwise". And I was asked another old question so many times that I was even starting to get annoyed: "So did you lose the bet?" (to which my standard answer is: "No, I won it. He bet me I wouldn't").

I found a bodiced dress in 15th century Italian noble style for only $65 on the last day, so naturally having saved so much money I had to go and spend more on a chemise to match it (and I still haven't found a good headdress, and are the ghillies really right for it? and what about jewelry?...). The outfit is still a-building, but I hope to present in it soon (on a cool cloudy day, the material is thick!).

A few persons asked if I was entering the Costume Contest, but I didn't find it at the right time until the last day. It was in front of an ale stand, in a building that had a balcony with a railing above. A man up on it announced how the contest was going to be done:

"Everybody who is going to compete line up and make a semicircle in front of me. First I will ask you to step out in front of the rest and introduce yourself with your name and where you are from. If you are a group competing together all of you step out at the same time. Then I will ask you to step forward a second time, and the volume of the applause from the audience will determine who wins."

There were 7 of us, including two kids, and only about 25 or so other people around. I stepped forward, and got a moderate response. The group of two women before me had several of what looked like their personal friends make loud cheers along with their clapping. A group of two other women in noble dresses with rather low décolletage gave the man upstairs a curtsy, and an even better view, and even the man upstairs started clapping and said, "I love it". The man said that it was inconclusive, and asked the two pairs of women to come forth a second time. One of the women in the first pair jumped up on a table, lifting her skirt and showing some leg, and got the loudest cheers. I figure I never had a chance, myself.

This faire allowed weapons, and there were quite a few daggers and swords being walked about, and more booths selling swords than at KC. A man in one of them was praising his wares: "Now this blade can easily go thru chain mail. Leather doesn't have a chance. See that chip out of that wood column there? Now that was just a light tap of this that did that. Here, feel this edge. Lightly now." He jabbed the point into the wood column and bent it into about the arc of a 45 degree angle. "Now this is my flexibility test..." I finally walked away with a feeling of I don't know if it was intrigue or apprehension.

This place was the only where I had such feelings. The Faire in general was voices in drawn out Oklahoma southern accents mixed with Basic Faire English and Scottish thruout the days, and acoustic music with lots of six-eight time drifting thru the air - just what I like a faire to be. Some memorable musical moments were Karen Troeh playing her Irish harp and singing "for I am going to marry a much nicer boy", Red McWilliams in his kilt playing the guitar and the "Alphabet Song" (not with the Mozart tune we all know) with it's un-bowdlerized nursery rhymes, Tom Campbell the bagpiper breaking into the Herman's Hermits tune "I. Henery the Eighth I am" during the pre-gate show, when even His Majesty cracked up laughing, and Boru's Ghost, with their four part vocal harmonies. It was all well worth the 250 miles.

(next week, GSLRF, Wentzville)

 - Butterfly Bill

"Greetings, milady...or is it milord?...or..um...."
First Rogu'ench of Renntopia
RenGeek with pewter computer imputer
IWG reject
Solarus Juvenillius Pastritis of Sarcastica. He who Grouches
while Biting the Wax Tadpole.
"possunt vincere nothi solum si facetias tuas a te tollunt"
http://www.grapevine.net/~butterflybill/BB.htm