Every Wednesday at Sugarhouse Park a group of like minded individuals come together and spend an hour or so LARPing. For those of you who have been living under rocks LARP stands for Live Action Role Play. Basically it means that a bevy of people dress up in actual armor and beat on each other with fake swords. Every week, weather permitting, this happens, and every week I sit and watch. I don't watch them because I want to mock them or belittle there passion like so many passerby's who stop and gawk. I don't watch them because I secretly want to construct and then wear my own chain mail and whack others with a foam spear. I watch because I love watching; I think it's supremely interesting and quite cool. Not cool like Freddie Prince Jr. in any teen movie ever cool. Cool because I feel like if I asked any of them why they were there, in the 90 degree July weather every week their answers would be something like this.
"Well Jessica, we come out here and do this because this is what we love. Because for a few hours every week we get to connect with other people who share our interest. We get to connect with a time in history that is awesome but long since past. We come here because at this place in this time we can forget our worries and our day jobs and truly be ourselves. WE come here to embrace our passion instead of denying it. That is why we come here."
And to me the fact that they are willing to come, risk embarrassment, and bodily harm all to do something they really love doing is extremely cool.
You don't secretly want to construct and wear your own chain mail and whack others with a foam spear? Because that sounds freaking awesome.
ReplyDeleteI don't secretly want to construct and wear my own chain mail. I do want to whack others with a foam spear. If I could do that latter and not the former I would.
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