I’m a bard now

You might be thinking, “Brie, what is a bard and why are you one now?” Well, a bard is a type of character in the game Dungeons & Dragons and believe it or not, being a bard is pretty close to my actual personality. {{more}}

I say all this because I had the chance to play D&D on Sunday. To play, you need to have a character you control, and I went all out creating mine; in a sense, she is my alter ego. Strixa, as I call her, is the aforementioned bard and she is also an owl. So in a sense, she is a bird bard. She’s also named after the scientific name for owls, so there’s a bit of an easter egg.

She would be pretty close to my age, and she already has a bit of a backstory.

Her village’s culture puts a pretty heavy honor on military service, and she has a selfless nature, but she’s also ambitious. Being that ambitious owl, Strixa joined her village’s equivalent of the Air Force as soon as she was of age, and was immediately stationed out of the country after basic training.

She traveled from village to village and worked her way up the ranks, becoming a colonel and enjoying the responsibility and leadership. During her travels, she had the opportunity to experiences different cultures and became interested in music and art.

However, her culture staunchly hated music. Talking with her friends and family further affirmed this for her, as they disapproved of her newfound passions. Still, something in her yearned to create music but her responsibilities to the “Air Force” were becoming too great to bear.

She saw combat a few times and in her final fight was when she had the idea to leave. To do this, she attempted to “fly” off a cliff, severely injuring her wings in the process. Too injured to continue service, she was honorably discharged. However, an official under her claimed she faked her injuries and she was subject to investigation.

During the investigation, she was made to testify under oath, hooked up to a lie detector. The investigation revealed Strixa had actually been injured, but since the injuries were self-inflicted, she lost her honorable discharge and was exiled from the village.

In that time, she found religion and she found a new sense of purpose. She travelled from village to village, learned to play the hand-drum, and began performing at taverns. Shunning her culture, she preached a one-culture mindset during her performances, a key aspect of her religion.

Word got back to her village that she was doing this and they sent spies to watch her perform. Once it was confirmed she was doing this, her former village made every effort possible to throw her in jail, claiming she was in violation of a law that prohibited travelling outside the region, with the exception of military service. She stood trial for this, however, her defense claimed her exile means she isn’t subject to the laws of the village. A jury found this to be true and she walked away free.

Now a free bird, Strixa joined a group of travelers where her current adventure begins…

Now, her backstory isn’t entirely parallel with my backstory. I admit, I’ve never been in the military, nor had any adverse run-ins with law enforcement. But Strixa and I share an ambitious mindset, a love for music and art and have been in the position where we were unhappy with our life direction. Sure, her method of changing her life was more drastic. But sometimes it takes a leap of faith to figure out what you want to do. She flew off a cliff; I flew off to Georgia.

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