Lately I've been worried about something - that I do not have the necessary self-motivation to pursue HEMA to the highest degree. That is, one of my ambitions had always been to become one of "the Names" in WMA - you know, the people who seem to be on the instructor list of almost any event, the people who when you think of a specific art you think of them (example: Italian rapier = Tom Leoni). The thing is that I've always known this about myself - even as a musician during high school I really didn't like solo practice. Group practice I looked forward too but I couldn't really get up the gumption to practice the sax on my own on a regular basis, but I would practice because it was necessary for group practice/concerts to go well. While I was living in Eugene, solo practice was easy for the same reason - it made group lessons at UO or the salle go smoother (and there was the added pressure of teaching).

Part of what has put me into a non-practice rut since moving from Eugene (I think) is partially due to money issues. My wife is in her first year of teaching after finishing graduate school, I am contemplating graduate school, and so thinking about buying new armour, or enough wasters to start teaching Armizare, traveling half-way across the country for events, etc. begins to put a strain on our finances that we just can't handle right now. That is the reason I've been looking into other sword arts to study - arts that require less armour to practice, arts whose weapons are less expensive, etc. - because longswords, poleaxes, and their required bouting/safe practice armour is expensive.

Options so far have included:
-Rapier
-Sword & Buckler (of various traditions)
-Bolognese School
-Military Sabre
-Backsword/Baskethilt swords (mainly because single-sticks are cheap)

I uess I'm jsut putting this out there is the hope that others have had the same issues and maybe have some advice for me?