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Ragnarök

What better way to celebrate the harvest fest than with the telling of a catastrophe? The crops have been safely brought home, the sustenance for another year is assured, the community readies for the cold days and the slowing down of life itself until we celebrate our dead. But for now, we rest from the happy toil of harvest. And tonight, children, gather round the fire, we will be telling you the story of... Ragnarök!

That was how I felt when I started to prepare for the great initiative of the guys at Yggdrasil. We were going to re-enact the Fall of the Gods - a catching story if there ever was one. We divided up the parts among ourselves - Heimdall and Thor, Odin and Fenrir, Gullveig and Freyja. I was going to be in it as Hildibrands, an "everyman" point of view on one of the most tragic events of the legend, the death of Balder. And just to add to the chaos, I took part in it also as the god Freyr. It was fascinating and in a way funny. I didn't know that much about it, so I took a crash course while I was writing. Apart from Internet links, my desk was more stacked with books than when I'm working - above all the Voluspa. But this is exactly what I hoped to do on AW; share what little knowledge I have and learn by "playing". I felt more than a touch of hybris playing a god, but I really got into it, to the point that I wrote the first two Freyr posts in a detached third person and then forgot and wrote the last post in the first person. I really felt like I were in front of the fireplace with a pot on my head and a branch in my hand, getting into the part for the children and throwing myself on the floor "dying" in the most spectacular way! Now I've talked a lot about my impressions - it was the first time I did such a thing - but everybody was great in bringing to life the Twilight of the Gods. We thoroughly massacred each other, there was a wacky sideshow at the Red Boar Tavern, which is *still* going on and getting wackier by the minute... and I am grateful to everybody for the fun and looking forward to a new experience. Now Balder will be reborn, and after this darkness the sun, too, will soon start waxing again. See you at Yule.

Ragnarök

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