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Avie
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« on: July 25, 2007, 08:05:03 AM » |
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Alrighty -
I've put off the waxing poetic, hoping all the words would have a new home on a blog section of the DE website, but I've since come to realize that we're going to want to do the bloggy thing right, and if I don't start the waxing, I'll never get it all out.
On Saturday, a very nice woman from Rutgers who is doing a documentary on gaming had her camera in the Sugarfest setup. Mark Andrews of Wargaming (not Wargamming, note.) started talking about how Vinny and I really pull things together and without us at the top, none of the convention would be possible. Exhaustion, distractions and other factors kept me from being eloquent - or even coherent - as I tried to express to the camera how important the actual workings of DE are to the success of the convention.
Let me start by saying that Mark and his wife Felicia are among the brightest spots in my convention sky - their enthusiasm, sweet natures, gently supportive words and overall positive attitudes really make it a pleasure to work with them. Anytime we've had differing opinions, it's been handled gracefully and quietly, and I simply adore both of them. (If you're in the habit of saying prayers or adding somebody to your thoughts when you meditate, they've had a shittacular year so far, and could use all the love we can share for them.)
I don't remember now what Mark was saying to the camera, but I do remember that what I wanted to say is that the most important part of what we do is that we view ourselves and each other as family. Sure, sometimes we're talking about the aunt nobody wants to talk to once she gets into the brandy at Thanksgiving, or the uncle who embarrasses everybody while standing in line at DisneyWorld, but we're family no less. We get just as passionate, and sometimes the faces we show each other are as ugly as the ones we show our bloodkin. When the chips are down, registration is half an hour late opening and everybody's ready to strangle me for needing to add "just two more things! They're small. swear!" to the pre-reg packets, the group pulls together and Makes It Work. There were nearly a half-dozen people covering my gap on Wednesday night, helping me get just the perfect effect from having Avatar System documents in the packets, and I can't tell you how much it meant to me that not a single person got huffy or frustrated. They said "It's a vision. let's make it work" and didn't even blink when we were still closing envelopes behind reg while people were picking up their badges.
When we realized that there were no speakers for Con Suite, no matter how ungracious I was in my crankiness over that glitch, the staff swooped in and summoned a sound system out of nowhere. Was it perfect? no. but was it functional and did anybody other than me notice that it wasn't quite what I wanted? No. When I needed the Con Suite rearranged no fewer than three times before it settled into a configuration that made the impact we wanted, was there a single complaint or roll of the eyes? Not a one.
It's the fact that the group of people who help us run DEXCON get it - really, truly seem to get that what we do is special and unlike any other convention in the world - that keeps us going. The more people who get it - the more emails that come in saying "hey, I never saw a single issue the staff didn't catch gracefully" or "I don't know how you do it - I was just an attendee and I'm wiped", the stronger our core is.
Usually sometime on Wednesday, I pass into a fatalistic "If it blows up now, there's nothing I can do about it" point of no return. It's ok to be calm, because there's nothing I can do to save the things that might go wrong and all we can do is the best we've got. Then, by Saturday, it relaxes into a truly comfortable state of "Wow. What we do is really something else." I feel my gait loosen, I feel my back straighten and no matter how much I'm hurting, I stride through our convention full of pride. We do this. This motley, ragtag family of geeks, nerds, fangirls and boyz, have put together something much bigger than the sum of our parts. And it makes me misty every single time.
(xposted to Double Exposure Conventions, my LJ and copied to our blogs when they get setup)
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