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There was a moment at Wiscon when I was dancing with everyone in the dark at the Genderfloomp, that I stopped dancing, looked around, and burst into tears.
These are my people. I don’t want them to go.
I had ditched a family trip to Florida to be at Wiscon. I had a reading Friday night with the Oxford Comma Bonfire with Vylar Kaftan, Michael Underwood and Nancy Hightower which went well. I was on a panel called “Remote vs Intimate Gods in literature”, which had a former Methodist who was now atheist, a former Catholic who converted to Judaism, and a woman Lutheran pastor who lives with her female partner in Tennessee. The discussion we had was wonderful, and I’m not just talking about the panel—but the long discussion we panelists had afterward with each other. I got a taste of the Kindred Reading Series. And I participated at the Sign out for the first time ever. Got to sign four copies of Dark Faith: Invocations. I was so excited, the first signing I did, I misspelled the word ‘ask’. Because I was so awesome. Or maybe tired.
But most of all, the conversations I had with the people. Ohhhh…my fellow black geeks, asian geeks, puerto rican geeks, gay geeks, trans geeks, bi geeks, poly geeks, straight geeks, atheist geeks, agnostic geeks, muslim geeks, christian geeks, pagan geeks. All of us together in one place. Sure, there were debates and arguments and words said that made people get the stink-eye and misunderstandings, but who doesn’t get that in a family reunion.
And this was indeed a family reunion.
That was why, at the Genderfloomp dance, I realized that I didn’t want any of them to go. I only get to see most of these people once a year.
Sean M. Murphy wrote a blog post that better sums up my feelings. And yeah, there’s going to be a few days when I’ll look around and feel glum and feel out of sorts with the normal world. But it’s okay. It won’t be the same, but I will continue to talk to my Wiscon friends on the internet. Occasionally, there’ll be a couple of us at other cons, like Mo*Con, which is like a smaller, room party. And knowing that N.K Jemisen and Hiromi Goto will be the Guests of Honor at Wiscon 38 already has me planning for next year’s activities.
These are my people. They never really go.
