Needle in my Arm

Thorvald coined the phrase this weekend.  I have a new addiction & obsession.  I can't get enough of it.  I am hooked.  I constantly have sword play on the brain.  Every step I take is translating to advances or retreats, cross-overs and demi-voltes.  My head is aware of muscle extension and contraction, balance and reflex.  It's been twenty years since I've had this kind of awareness, and it's invigorating, empowering and exciting.
Don Sionainn had us put masks on this weekend, and started showing me how each move rolls into the next.  How a lunge, recover, party four attack flows into a demi-volte with offline attack.  I am giddy; setiously intoxicated with the whole learning process.
Sunday, Sionainn made me watch an episode of Firefly with my mask on, to get used to focusing beyond the black mesh, and to learn depth perception with a screen in front of my face.  It was a silly "Daniel-san, paint the fence, wax the car" activity, but it got me used to the mask before a sword came at my face.
Thorvald took me to Don Aaron's last night, and His Excellency agreed to make me a gorget fitted to me, so my windpipe doesn't get crushed when a head shot tips my mask and pulls Vilhelm's gorget into my throat.
And today, Don Tarkash agreed  to help me practice during the week.  I get to play with swords every day! 

I waited twenty years for the "right time" in my mundane and SCA life to have the opportunity to learn this art.
And the phrase "when the student is ready, the Master shall appear" is so true.  I have five masters who want to feed this addiction.  Five.  I am beyond flattered, and highly motivated to learn more.  It feeds my competitive nature, makes my doctor happy (I got my first "normal results" back from the lab in five years!). All around, in every facet of my life, things are improving.  Things that used to disappoint me or set me on edge have no influence on me.  They are *chuckle* outside my circle, and until my circle expands to include them, they have no control over my joie de vivre.

Gratitude, hope, elation and tiny bruises are my sustenance .  My hand becomes an extension of fluid steel.  Strength, poise and balance are my mantra.  I have found another happy place within the SCA.

As for the ACC, my fighting doublet will be a mock up for my Veste.  See, yet other example of how this joy intertwines itself into every face of my life.