Beginnings

Good morning excited and eager new readers! Thank you for taking the time to read my first (of hopefully many!) blog posts. For those of you not familiar with me and my journey thus far, let me introduce myself! I am the Dame Elizabeth and have been infatuated and completely overtaken for my love of horses and jousting. About a year and a half ago, I unknowingly stumbled upon the sport of jousting, and since then have been enthusiastically pursuing it. Focusing on the full contact style, I have on and off been pursuing this style for the last year or so, and have most recently been invited to join up with Warhorse Productions and their team, the New Riders of the Golden Age. They are the oldest full contact troupe in the United States and focus as much on horsemanship as they do on jousting. I was picked up by them after jousting at Sherwood Forest Faire in Texas the past few years and so far, I couldn’t be happier with my decision to ride with them! I’ve quit my job working at a small animal clinic and am ready to dedicate myself to my passion.

Now that the introductions are out of the way, let me begin to tell you the tales of my adventures thus far in the distant land of… Sterling, New York.

State Signs!

Rather than spending pages recounting my travels and tales thus far, let me summarize; I traveled from Colorado to New York over the course of 3 days, spanning a total of 9 states, 1,822 miles, and over 26 hours in the car. It. Was. Not. Fun. Especially when you’re driving alone. But thankfully I had amazing friends whom I was able to stay with on my travels, and had good snacks to eat, and jammin’ music to listen to, so it was manageable, to say the least. Even though I’ve only been here a week now, I’ve already made some wonderful friends, and enjoy the crew that I’ll be working with (more on them later). I’m staying in a tent, complete with futon, lighting, fan, etc. so the situation isn’t as bad as you might think. There has been some talk of raccoons forming raiding parties and attacking at night, so I’ve been sleeping with one eye open thus far (UPDATE: the stories were right, there are definitely nosy coons in the night that cause you to lose sleep and go to drastic measures to deter them). The bugs are of course atrocious, and I’m trying exceptionally hard not to scratch my numerous mosquito bites as I try to write this. But it’s all worth it because the horses and people here are just fueling my passion even further, and every night I go to bed with a smile on my face because I’m so content.

When I first decided to actually pursue this opportunity to come out here and work with the troupe, I had a lot of people question my choices because they couldn’t understand the logic behind it. Truth be told, there is no logic, but instead there is passion. I’ve come to realize just how much of an impact horses have on my life, and while this transition does not make any sense logically, it makes sense in my heart. Today I woke up sore and bug bitten after an unfulfilling night of sleep, but as soon as I got out to the horses and started morning chores, everything seemed to fade away. For me, being around horses is therapy, and there really is nothing better for my soul. The past few days I’ve faced challenges with the horses I’ve rode, but there is nothing quite as fulfilling as that moment when it clicks between you and the horse and you both flow together harmoniously. Time doesn’t matter. Personal problems go away. Stress and doubt dissolve. It’s just you and a two thousand pound animal working together. I’ll definitely spend some more time in my future posts going over the riding techniques we focus on here and everything I’ve been learning, but I cone wholeheartedly say that this is some of the most rewarding riding I’ve done. I’ve left every ride happy with the accomplishments I’ve made, and am proud of how my riding skills are slowly improving. My mentors here are both wonderful riders and teachers, and I’m so grateful to have the resources I do through them.

Besides the jousting crew being stellar, I’m very fortunate to be able to be a part of the faire as a whole. The cast here is wonderful, and Sterling Renaissance Faire is the only faire to hire professional actors as their cast. Aside from being skilled and top notch at their job, they are all friendly and welcoming, and I’ve already started to get to know them all. Friday evening, they practiced their “pub sing”, which is basically an event at the end of the day where the entire cast gathers and sings song together. The sun was setting behind them, and as we sat there and watched them practice, it made me realize how fortunate I am to have this opportunity with these amazing people. The entire cast is all about love and happiness, and I’ve heard countless tales of people who have done as I have, and left their 9-5 jobs to live this lifestyle. Everyone is always all smiles, and it makes me more confident that I made the right decision.

Fair opens this weekend, so soon we will begin blocking out the show and figuring out our positions. I think I will do a mid-week blog post that focuses more on the riding aspect, and then spend next Monday after opening weekend focusing on how first weekend went. If there’s ever anything that you as a reader would like for me to focus on, please don’t hesitate to let me know and I will gladly focus an entry on that! And any questions you may have, please forward them on to me.

Thanks again for reading and I look forward to your feedback on my first post!