No, Nay, Never No More

[ladysprite]

This is my third year on Arisia Concom. This is my last year on Arisia Concom. I'm counting on y'all to remind me of this, should I suffer a bout of simultaneous amnesia and temporary insanity at any point next year. I love the con, and I like being helpful, and it feels good to know that I'm accomplishing something, however insignificant, for the community that has been my home for mumblemany years. But.... I'm just not cut out for this sort of thing.

I'm a pathologically organized individual, though I suppose you wouldn't know it from looking raound my personal space. I like planning, and preparing, and thinking things through in advance, and having them done far, far before they might possibly be needed in order to spend the rest of the time tweaking and rearranging at my leisure. In school, I was the kid who wrote my papers the week they were assigned, just so I could go back and reread them and rewrite them a half-dozen times before they were due. I have a deep and possibly life-threatening allergy to procrastinating, slacking, and the last minute in general.

In contrast, the last minute is where fandom lives. It's one of the only communities I've encountered where the eleventh hour is not merely accepted, but thought of as fifty-nine minutes early. Any attempts I've made to work outside that have felt rather like trying to eat soup with a fork - noone will stop you, but they look at you kind of funny, and while you manage to accomplish the occasional chunk, stuff still manages to slip away despite your best efforts to the contrary.

I am a fork-and-entree person in an Instant Cup-A-Soup world. I think next year I will merely purchase my membership, or steel myself for paneling, and rest assured in the knowledge that, somehow, in ways I cannot even begin to comprehend and don't really want to try, things don't catastrophically explode all over the place.....

Comments

[dagibbs.livejournal.com]

where the eleventh hour is not merely accepted, but thought of as fifty-nine minutes early

Oh, that is SO true! And I love your turn of phrase on it.

[alexx-kay.livejournal.com]

Ditto. May I steal it for my quote file?

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

Um... sure! :) *blush*

[gingicat]

There's a lot of that going around. So far they've lost the head of filk, the head of gaming, the head of LARP, and the innkeeper.

[alexx-kay.livejournal.com]

And the person who ran Con Suite for the last several years.

[z-gryphon.livejournal.com]

Well, hey, it could be worse.

[jducoeur]

Wow. I've seen a fair amount of vicious fannish politics (and been sadly involved in a little), but -- wow. That's downright horrifying...

[starcat-jewel.livejournal.com]

There's always a certain amount of that in con-running; it's the nature of the beast. People cancel on you at the last minute, or the hotel yanks a room out from under you, or any one of half-a-dozen other things happens, and things have to be rearranged to deal with it.

Beyond that, some cons are better at pre-arranging things than others. Much of it depends on the concom, and established concoms tend to attract people who have the same basic approach to planning, whatever that approach may be. Sounds to me as though Arisia is heavy on the "last-second spontaneous" approach, and if you're not comfortable with that, then you're right to bow out gracefully.

[mr-teem.livejournal.com]

You've done good work! But, yeah, I can see walking away. This year has been...interesting in dealing with it from the outside.

[vettecat.livejournal.com]

I'm a little confused by this... last year, the LARPs were confirmed in midsummer (though the details got tangled later b/c of confusion over what they needed). I wasn't running program the previous year, but knowing who was, I suspect they were similarly organized ahead. The timing this year was erratic, but I wouldn't call it typical. And many of us on concom are pathologically organized - you should have seen my charts last year, or my playbook for our wedding. :-) There are inevitably snags, but that happens with any volunteer group - life sneaks up and bites you sometimes. Of course if you don't want to run LARPs anymore, then you shouldn't, but if you enjoy it then don't deprive yourself.

Don't give up yet!

[wren13.livejournal.com]

I really expect 2006 to be an exception. phi has been working on this con for over a year now, I've been working on the art show since the fall, many people are joining in early for a change. I had to take this year off myself, 'cause I couldn't handle this con chair, but I'm definitely back, and will miss you!