Renaissance Festivals

Generally speaking, Pagans enjoy appropriating cultures and time periods to their own norms. They also enjoy dressing up in costume, Arthurian myth, bellydancing, browsing without any intention of buying, and anything vaguely Celtic (all of which will be covered in future SPCL entries). It is therefore only fitting that Pagans adore that perfect storm of all above elements, the Renaissance Festival.

Renaissance Festivals, or Ren Faires, are the pilgrimage of the modern Pagan. Pagans who barely have the motivation to regularly bathe themselves will trek across several states dressed in nicer clothes than they wore to their own wedding in order to hike around in extreme temperatures and they will pay for the priveledge.

If you have never been to a Ren Faire, try to imagine an outdoor shopping mall catering to Pagans of all persuasions where everyone is dressed like extras from that old Robin Hood movie with Errol Flynn and they all quote Monty Python and the Holy Grail while swilling large quantities of mead.

At any given Ren Faire there will be at least one young woman dressed like an Amy Brown fairy, a gentleman dressed as a Sorcerer's Apprentice style wizard, and a young man in a cloak with a pentacle the size of a dinner plate on his person. These people will happily volunteer to you that they are in fact Pagans, which may cause you, should you also identify as a Pagan, the desire to impale yourself on the nearest sharp object.

Sharp objects of the cheap and bladed variety are in abundance at the Ren Faire, so do be careful. Should you encounter anyone with more than three visible weapons on his or her person at the Ren Faire you may be dealing with an Advanced Pagan. It is best to disengage.