Whispers of Untruths

Rumor mills. Gotta love ’em. Or not.

I’ve been pretty quiet in the SCA so far. Not quite three years in, I tend to keep to myself and my circle of friends and don’t really rock the boat. This coming weekend, however, I may have to do some investigative work to find out where the rumor about me is truly coming from, because it seems that, despite my low profile, I’ve become the target of some gossip.

It’s not terribly bad gossip, but it is incorrect info that’s being spread, so I have to put the kibosh on it before things get crazy. I know that a lot of people have my back, but that’s not going to stop people from spreading misinformation apparently.

Am I terribly worried? Not really, but I can’t just let it go. People shouldn’t spread gossip regardless of how big or little the effect of said gossip might be. If you don’t know the whole story, then keep quiet. It’s simple. Don’t spread shit, won’t be shit.

Don’t worry, though. I’m keeping a level head about it. I won’t go off on the spreader or spreaders of gossip. I won’t scream or yell or even cuss. I’ll have a reliable witness, a Peer in the Society, with me when/if the need arises to confront the person or persons who are spreading lies. A discussion will be had, and then, hopefully, that will be that. I’ll go on with my life, they’ll go on with theirs, and things will settle down.

In a month, things will slow down as far as commissions go, and I’ll be able to focus on my writing and on projects for myself and my husband. Despite all the embroidery I’ve done for others in the Society, I have almost zero garb with my own embroidery on it!! Same for my husband. Lol So I’ll remedy that in the months following Estrella War. We’ll both be working on using our arts for ourselves (being a little selfish, but after the amount of work for others we’ve both done I think more than makes up for it) for a bit before we start back on commissions for our arts.

I’ll keep on moving, regardless of the rumors floating about. I’m not going to let a little scuttlebutt keep me down. 😉

Slaying the Beast

Hey. How’s it going? Been a while. Yeah. Sorry about that.

I’ve been fighting a depressive episode for weeks. A month or more, maybe. I was so bogged down with deadlines and projects and stuff that I just hit a wall, and I hit so hard that I was knocked back a few pegs. I’m crawling back up, though, and I’m working on getting back to “normal”…whatever that is.

I haven’t wanted to write. I haven’t wanted to even look at my writing. I’ve just been churning out embroidery and sewing projects like there’s no tomorrow. Between my husband autocratting our Kingdom’s Twelfth Night event and the pile of to-dos leading up to Estrella War, I’ve been buried in SCA stuff and haven’t had the energy–physical, mental, or emotional–for anything else. And I’ve suffered because of it.

This past weekend was a productive one, from an SCA/housework standpoint. I finally got Christmas decorations put away, I got most of the laundry done, and I got two things checked off my “list” of pre-Estrella War projects. Most importantly, this productivity made me feel better about life in general, and this morning I was back to doing actual work. I got a short story edited and just about ready to submit to the anthology it’s going in, and I participated in the Write Event hashtags on Twitter, in earnest, for the first time in weeks.

There’s still a lot left to do before the War, but it’s more manageable. Here’s my list of stuff to be done in the next month:

Seems like a lot, but most of those projects are at least partly finished. The Pelican embroidery is about 1/3-1/2 done, the Toothless embroidery is halfway done, the embroidery on the bag is started and the fabric is cut, and my Valkyrie hood just has the pieces to be sewn for the reversible lining left, which are already cut out, so really the only non-started project is the embroidery on my friend’s hood, which shouldn’t take too long.

I always feel a rush of relief when I realize I’m digging my way out of a depressive hole, but I’ve got to be careful; if I get too excited about not being as depressed, I might end up swinging the pendulum the other way to the manic side, and while that might increase productivity for a while, it’s not going to solve the problem. I need to start prioritizing myself and my health, rather than trying to please everyone else.

My writing will be back on full swing after Estrella, but I’ll try to make myself get at least something done every day. The more I do, the more I’ll get done, and the better I’ll feel about it all. At least, that’s what I’m hoping.

I might even put on a little makeup today before work. Y’know, work on getting the outside to look like the inside’s starting to feel.

I’ll be okay. I promise. But yeah, this last episode was a doozy. Still is, a little bit. I’m getting there, though.

In demand and working hard

I know this blog has been quiet for a while, but I’ve got a nine minute window before I have to clock in for a busy day, so let’s see how much I can tell you….

Life has been hectic. Long work hours, lots of embroidery commissions on my plate, an event last weekend, and a period of three days where I accumulated about seven hours of sleep–total.

Last night I slept well, so I’m hoping that’s a good sign. I’m almost done with the picture embroidery on a Viking hood I’m making for someone, so soon I’ll just need to sew it together and do some seam treatments (which should go fairly quickly). After that, I have a larger project for a friend’s elevation, and after that I have a couple of quick embroidery projects, and–if I can get time–a couple MORE things for myself and my husband.

I’m trying to limit the number of commissions I take on, but the elevation piece was something I couldn’t pass up. After Estrella War, though, I plan on taking a break from commissions and focusing on work for my husband and myself. It looks really silly when I’m known across the kingdom for my embroidery, yet none of my garb is enbroidered!

That’s all I have time for right now! I’ll try to find time to post in more detail later.