POWER STRUGGLE

The Historic society is quiet as people straggle in.  The Elderly Lady is greeting everyone as usual. Around her the younger members are sitting. She talks quietly with each of them and tends to dominate the interactions. Around her are four young men and three young ladies. They are all around the age of 20-25 and are respectfully quiet when she speaks. The Redheaded woman is sitting there as well and quietly painting on a piece of fabric. Elderly lady is asking questions to each of her gathered youth. Most of it is about proper etiquette in court or how they need to behave on a daily basis.

As usual, another group begins to gather at the far side of the meeting hall. It is boisterous, loud, and full of laughter. A very tall man with glasses, a short woman with thick curls, a quieter man dressed as a Viking, a roman,  and a graying,  elderly, couple are all gathered around a table playing a dice game. The Thin Man walks in with a loud hello and makes his way around the room again. It is his usual custom to greet everyone with a hug. All but the Elderly lady. They don’t even look at each other. Thin Man goes over to the dice game and joins right in. This continues until the redhead woman calls for the meeting to begin.

Everyone sits at the long tables but Elderly lady keeps her youth gathered around her. It reminds me of a shield or a barricade. The topics of discussion range from upcoming and past events, to the group budget and necessities that need to be bought. Everything is happening at a civil level. The discussion is quiet and very level headed at this point. Things took a turn for the worst when Thin Man brought up an idea for a future event that he and several others wanted to host.

The idea was that at the next large event, our brewers club, host a donation tavern. People make donations to the group and in exchange get some of our home brewed alcohols. Many people on both sides of the table speak up about how they would love to do this and what event it could be done at. The idea is a popular one with everyone but the Elderly Lady. She sits there quietly and glares at any of her group that speak up in favor of it.

It was amazing how quickly the tables turned. The pleasant afternoon soon became much tenser. While the discussion was in full swing, Elderly lady brought her hand down on the table over and over. The loud sound startled everyone out of conversation and made us all look that direction. She exclaimed that The Thin Mans’ idea was stupid and that we shouldn’t listen to his ideas. They never have any merit. I think that this kind of shocked us all. She kind of leaned back in her chair and looked very satisfied with herself. Thin Man recovered quickly and leaned forward on the table with both hands. Kind of looked like an intimidation tactic to me. He stated that she should let the group make that decision and butt out. Arguing erupted from the two, too fast for me to pick out what was being said but the both got up and were standing toe to toe at one point. Neither was willing to back down. Redhead woman had finally had enough and stood up shouting for quiet.

The Viking came over to her side and said that this was no way for two adults to be behaving. Thin Man retorted that the Elderly lady was using the young group members as lackeys and servants. She declared that she didn’t make them do anything they didn’t want to. The two looked over at the group of younger people. None of them would meet the eyes of the arguers. I think they felt highly uncomfortable. Viking said that there were many issues that needed to be worked out and asked Thin Man and Elderly lady to step outside and solve their issues. Redheaded woman agreed to go with them to make sure that nothing bad happened.

As soon as they were outside, whispers erupted from both ends of the room. Viking cleared his throat and brought everyone’s attention back to the meeting. The meeting continued in an organized fashion from that point onwards. Eventually redheaded woman came back in to say that Elderly lady and Thin Man had left for the evening.

The meeting wrapped up with a strange sort of silence. Both ends of the table, being without their normal leaders seemed to have to talk together for the first time in a long time. This has been extremely awkward for me to write as it was happening.