Baby steps

I did it. I went to a bardic at Estrella. Outlands' to be precise, because I know them and I knew they would be kind. Turns out they'd decided not to have a competition this year and opted for a more informal gathering, which suits me just fine, thank you very much.

I hung out in the shadows. Then someone noticed and offered me a chair. Then someone noticed the hurdy gurdy and asked me to play. And despite a dousing due to a cooler leak during the trip to war and several days of trying to play it back in again, the hurdy gurdy rose to the occasion after dark and in Outlands' territory for the first time in three years, a medley of "Bacche Bene Venies" and "Fas et Nefas Ambulant" .

I sat through some Outlands & Calontir martial bits and some storytelling and some very good epic poetry traded between Guernin and a lady named Llamrei. And then I screwed up my nerve and said I had something martial too. I picked a starting pitch that was a little too high for comfort in my nervousness and I found myself singing big chunks of it with my eyes closed, but dammit, I got through "The Agincourt Carol" without a forgotten word or a broken note in the bunch, with Rowen chiming in on the choruses.

I didn't feel confident enough of having the lyrics down to try the "Oy Comamos y Bebamos" so I took my leave. But I'd sung. And it didn't suck, well, not too much. I even got a couple of Vivats.  And then I ended up singing the "Oy Comamos" for an audience of one back in my own camp, matching pace with the drumming from the West Kingdom Party.  Frederick liked it.

I'm back, I think.

Will post more later. It's been a long week.