Couple Find Their Place in Earlier Time

Nights and weekends, John and Carrie Oliver live in another time and proudly covet their strange kind of alter ego life.

They and an estimated 60,000 others are members of the worldwide Society of Creative Anachronism who seek happiness by living a make-believe life based on the Middle Ages.

For example, they greet other members with such terms as Milord and Milady, and if that isn’t acceptable, they might invite each other to an honorable mock fight to the death with wooden swords.

“We kind of attract a different type of person, people who don’t fit into the mundane modern world,” said Oliver, an Anaheim cable television employee who goes by the name Lord Colin Mordrake, the swamp dragon, after he leaves work.

Carrie is a computer company administrator and is called Lady Nikki Zotsdrake in her other life. She met John on an isolated field of combat in Colorado where she was clad in a highly polished suit of armor.

“I killed 10 combatants there,” boasted Carrie, who was decked out in a medieval costume and loads of gold chains as she strolled one recent Saturday around Mile Square Park in Fountain Valley.

Part of the park had been transformed into the mythical Kingdom of Caid.

Her husband added: “When they are dressed in armor you can’t tell whether it’s a man or woman fighting. My wife is an itty-bitty thing, but she held her own during the course of the day.”

Elegantly clad women and men who were trying to live a different life for a day were quartered in colorfully decorated tents for the happening there.

Spectators milled about wondering what was going on.

“My wife and I joined because we were looking for a simpler life than the one we have to live in today’s society,” said John, who gave up judo and karate to fight with a wooden sword. “I end up with a lot less bruises fighting with a wooden sword.”

He finds the mock fighting “fascinating. We all try to entertain each other because we like to do it. We all keep in mind it is just a game or else it could get out of hand.”

Before joining, John said, he belonged to a number of community and service organizations that didn’t meet his personal needs.

“We all have jobs, but we’re looking for something else,” he continued. “The Middle Ages and the philosophy of that time is what we like to foster. In the world today everyone seems to have that us-versus-them philosophy.”

When the group meets, the Olivers say, “We’re armed with an attitude and weapons.”

Besides the mock fighting, they added, “everyone in the society is friendly and polite, even to the newest members. We are a very polite society when we battle or meet each other.”

He said when a gentleman meets a lady at their gatherings, he is prone to kiss her hand.

The society holds most of its gatherings in isolated areas, but meets at times in more populated areas to attract new members.

“The more people that see and know of us, the more members we can get,” said John, whose main hope is to become knighted by the group.

It is the most prestigious honor besides becoming king.

“I’d also like to become king,” he confided.

If it isn’t enough to have police officers knock heads with firefighters to draw spectators at the third annual Orange County 911 Football Bowl on April 27 at 7 p.m. at Orange Coast College, the sponsors are offering other incentives.

One will come in the form of a silent auction the same evening.

The items up for auction will include an autographed Wayne Gretsky hockey stick, a Rams helmet signed by quarterback Jim Everett, a team-signed Lakers basketball, a team-signed Angels baseball and a Chuck Norris autographed karate belt.

All proceeds go to Drug Use Is Life Abuse Foundation and the Olive Crest Treatment Center for abused and neglected children.

And if that doesn’t draw a crowd, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will be in attendance to help give out official Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to children in attendence.