Black Point — 10 Years Gone
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Art by Holly Defount |
It’s been 10 years since the Renaissance Faire at Black Point ended.
Every year about this time I get the jones. It is pretty subtle some years, and some years hits me like a brick. This was a brick year. And it’s one of those things that if you say to another Faire veteran, “Isn’t it that time…?” they know exactly what you mean, and when you try to explain it to someone who wasn’t there, you cannot make it make sense. Folks who are veterans of the Southern Faire get the jones in springtime, and us Northerners get it in late summer.
So here I am… missing Faire. Faire gave me so much. Which sounds weird, but, for example, I cannot be startled by strangers. Pretty much anyone can throw improv at my head, and I’m ready to catch. Public speaking holds zero fear for me, and in fact I’ve been told again and again in corporate and advocacy settings that my presentation skills are excellent. Good thing none of those folks know that those skills were honed not at Toastmasters, but on the dusty streets of Black Point Faire, rolling in the dirt, spitting water, and hollering over the crowd in a bad Elizabethan accent while pretending to be falling-down drunk as soon as the opening parade went by at 10 AM. What do you do with a drunken sailor, anyway?
I miss the people. Faire was home to more creative, colorful, wacky, fascinating personalities than anyplace I’ve ever been. From the profound to the pathological, Faire was home for all of us, and that provided the starting ground for understanding. I may not have agreed with or even liked the choices that some of my fellow actors made, but I learned to roll with it. Faire was a great place for learning to leave your judgment at the door.
I miss sitting on the deck of the hootch long into the night, singing non-Faire songs and discussing philosophy, storytelling, and the finer points of various beverages. I learned more about tea and whisky on that deck… I miss being my unexpurgated self. I miss being able to say what I think when I think how I think, and not worry about consequences or political correctness. Cutting loose at Faire for 12 weekends every year was critical to my sanity, critical to retaining a sense of myself in the onslaught of everyday society. The outside world is all about compliance; Faire was all about creativity and personality, improvisation and showmanship.
I miss the place. It sounds goofy, but Black Point was magical. I can’t describe it. I won’t even try. But it was more magical than anyplace I’ve ever been. Maybe it was all those people who believe in fairies in one small place being so intense for so long that the energy seeped into the trees and rocks. Maybe not. But not being there actually hurts sometimes.
I can’t believe it’s been ten years since that chapter of my life passed me by. I still remember the final ringout parade. I remember sobbing the entire length of the thing. I remember thinking that something so fabulous could not really end. I remember being stunned by how not-Black Point the following year’s Faire at Nut Tree was. I didn’t have the heart to carry on after that. I and my life have moved on to other things.
But some years, when the jones hits, I sit outside on the deck at night, and try to catch a hint on the wind of oak and bay trees, of the heat given off by the road after the sun set, of the chai at Mullah’s. I can hear the singing in the radio of my mind, sometimes, and I’m unutterably sad for what was lost.
So once again, farewell to Black Point. Being there was a turning point in making me who I am and I’m grateful forever. But I so miss you.