otoh...

If she's a 'Lady' she's an aristocrat, not a commoner.

It makes more sense to think of her as a Queen giving a present to a fellow monarch instead of a smith who happened to come up with a great weapon.

I always figured she was the ruler of the fae who lived in the other dimensional version of England. She wanted peace and harmony in the human realm because conflict would spill over into her possessions.

President Kennedy made a joke that he'd go down in the history books as the man who brought Jackie Kennedy to Paris. We think of the Lady in relation to Arthur because that's the only reference we have. She had a life long before and long after she met him.

Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government!

I'm sold, my head canon is now Bismuth from Steven Universe handing King Arthur a sword fit for one of the Crystal Gems

https://steven-universe.fandom.com/wiki/Bismuth_(character)

Not jacked. Us smiths are actually kinda lithe. We're strong and have endurance for days, we don't have bulk because that would make our jobs harder.

Many people consider the lady of the lake to be Morgana La Fae, and that Arthur's entire life was just one of her little schemes.

Look, strange women lying in ponds is no basis for a government!

We also visualize her emerging from the lake as though she lives at the bottom of it, with the sword fully formed. If she's smithing the sword she needs fire, so does she live next to the lake, or does myth magic allow her to do metalwork underwater?

Once we start applying reality there are a lot of questions. Does she have a full smithing career and trade, or does she only ever make the sword? Because that means that either Excalibur isn't as unique as we were led to believe, or her entire existence is about that one sword handoff, which is somehow more objectifying than thinking of her as some kind of water nymph, slender and graceful or not, who makes or acquires the sword magically, and spends most her time doing mysterious but unrelated magic.

So "lady of the lake" being a buff smithy lady, living in a hut near a swamp? I can live with that.

I just assume it was a royal family with the “royal sword” hidden out in the swamps.

now all i can imagine is a scene in monty python and the holy grail where torbjorn from overwatch dressed in python-esque drag emerges from a sad little pond holding the sword, covered in various plants and detritus, and looking like a completely normal person.
Meanwhile everyone else treats her with reverence, like she's radiating dignity.

my headcannon: