Especially after an event or a convention where I circulate cards out to try and steer people into visiting my website, I admittedly try to put on a little bit of a face for a little bit, to be slightly more interesting or engaging, to try and get people to possibly become one of my site’s regular six readers, and not necessarily just be a tourist to view and download pictures.
I try and post fairly relevant, or at least interesting things as fluff posts while I arduously slave away at trying to get my photos up as efficiently as possible, so I don’t lose the attention and potential repeat visits from viewers during the week(s) after said events/conventions.
Believe me, I have a lot of things I’d like to say about Dragon*Con, and I’m the type of nerd that jots down thoughts and notes, so I don’t forget them, and can revisit them when I’m in a more appropriate frame of mind to be writing about them. And there are several things I’m eventually going to write about the convention, but very recently, I’ve admittedly been downtrodden by several things, and positive face in light of potential new viewers be damned, ultimately my brog exists for me to write out the things swirling around in my head, even if they’re not always the most positively entertaining things out there.
Basically, I left Dragon*Con in a fairly positive state of mind; as is often the case after a convention where I took a lot of pictures, I’m excited to get home and unload my camera and get to actually look at the pictures I took, and relax, gather my thoughts, and prepare for the week(s) of trying to come up with content for my site, as well as the long process of individually processing photos and trying to get them looking the best and up as quickly as possible.
Things eventually began going downhill; superficially at first, like watching my college football season basically end after the very first game of the season, on account of Virginia Tech’s QB Michael Brewer having his collarbone broken in a loss to #1 Ohio State. The following morning back at work, the domino effect of having my work phone blown up all weekend from people who don’t seem to grasp the concept of weekends, much less holiday weekends, caught up to me, and I had an absolutely dreadful work day that made me question my choice to switch jobs, after business hours work, as well as the necessity to have worked some from home, more or less derailing my personal after-hours leisure time.
However, those problems became nothing at all after a conversation I had with my mother during a phone call that I had intended on being a routine catch-up call, where it was revealed to me that a family member had a recent surgery, and long story short, the dreaded C-word came into play. Details are still sketchy due to a lack of information as well as the typical language barrier between my parents and I, but there’s sparsely a mistake when it comes to interpreting cancer.
It’s no secret that I’m pretty detached from my family, mostly on account of the distance I live from everyone else, but this news was still disheartening and absolutely deflating. The thoughts of a worst-case scenario are frightening and depressing, and naturally would be best served if they never come to fruition.
Anyway, I’m not sharing all this information because I’m phishing for sympathy or trying to sadistically rain on everyone’s reflective post-D*C period. Believe me, I’d rather be writing about my own D*C thoughts or a satirical reflection of how lucky Ohio State was to injure Michael Brewer. I’d rather not have a gray cloud in my head when looking through the pictures I took of hundreds of costumers, selfies with numerous friends, and some stunning pictures of the mythical girlfriend, and reflect, reminisce and process with clarity.
But this is what happens when real life gets in the way from time to time, and people like me feel the desire to write about it, because life isn’t always sunshine and lollipops, and even the bad things are worth reflecting on.
It’s doubtful I will bring this up again any time… soon. Because in spite of the wet blanket, I also want to get back to a sense of normalcy, where I don’t have to feel upset about the world, upset with my job, and where I can write random things about conventions, wrestling, League of Legends, and the stupid shit Atlanta does sometimes.
And if you are a new visitor, hoping to find some pictures of yourself and are instead greeted with this wall of text with a downer context, I kind of apologize in advance and maintain the promises that I will be working on pictures, and they will be up within somewhat of a reasonable two-week turnaround, tops.
It’s reckless to say that real life is always bad, because it most certainly is not. But damn, can it really hit hard from time to time, when it comes to bad news.
