Admittedly, I’ve had a hard time finding the motivation to write lately, which sucks a little bit more considering my general desire to have at least a post every weekday. It’s been somewhat challenging on some days, but given the fact that there are about 17-18 waking hours of each day, usually something piques my interest, or a thought pops into my head that is adequate enough to get the words flowing.
The thing is right now, I’m apparently using a lot of my concentration these days in preparation for Dragon*Con, which as of the time I’m writing this is a hair over two weeks away. This isn’t something that should be the least bit worrisome for your average attendee, but being one of those weirdoes that likes to have a costume for D*C means that two weeks isn’t so much a chunk of time we’re wishing to erode faster, contrarily, we’re wishing we had more of it.
Needless to say, I’m trying my hardest to not let the thoughts of doubt creep into my psyche, and make me feel like I’ve got an insurmountable boulder to drag up the hill. I do feel as if I’m making some decent progress, in spite of the fact that I’ve had an immensely difficult time in getting the wheels turning over the summer, and in all frankness I shouldn’t be in this situation had I gotten my ass in gear at an earlier time.
Regardless, a large part of the apathy and unwillingness to start has a lot to do with the fact that it just doesn’t feel like my heart is in it this year. It’s not to say that I’m not looking forward to D*C this year, quite the contrary, but it does feel like the mood going into it, as far as my own little world and its subsequent social circles are concerned, isn’t as excited or anticipatory as it’s been in prior years.
Numerous people I know are bowing out of this year, are not planning on going next year, declaring this year “the last,” and other things that are kind of tapping the brakes on the annual ride going into the event. Obviously, a lot of the circumstances are logical, as are rationales for passing in the future, but it doesn’t not curb the enthusiasm just a little bit for those of us who are still going this year, and planning on it in the future, too.
I get it too; D*C is expensive, time-consuming, and for those like me who like to make things for them, way more involved than just Labor Day weekend. A ton of money goes into hotels, and for those who don’t have the luxury of being local (which is something I don’t take for granted, either), the travel is too. And ultimately, for what? A weekend being crammed like sardines in a can into three hotels, where space to stretch your arms is a luxury, a lot of abrasive internet nerds bringing the obnoxious into the real world, and basically hanging out with 50,000 like-minded people.
Personally, I have little interest in convention programming, and prefer to simply walk around and take advantage of the mass conglomeration of costumes and other creativity, while honing my novice picture taking skills to the best that I can. Seems like a pretty resource-exhausting activity just to hang out and take pictures.
But I still do it, and I still look forward to it, and as far as I’m concerned, barring a catastrophic time this year, such would be the case for next year and the future as well.
The point of this post is basically that in spite of the fact that there doesn’t seem to be nearly as much excitement and anticipation going into this year’s D*C, I’m personally still looking forward to the weekend, and the pursuit of constructing a costume is literally consuming the vast majority of my mental capacities in a race against time on top of it all.
That being said, unless I stumble across the right sources of inspiration that really stimulate writing, don’t be surprised if there’s more, almost rushed-feeling text-only posts until the event passes.
