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Dexcon: Closing Time
Aug. 4th, 2009 11:42 amSo, the 12th [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] is over, leaving with it the usual wreckage of sleep deprivation, excessive alcohol consumption and financial destruction, as well as the satisfaction of four days spent with a number of people who, I've realised recently, have known me longer than anyone outside of my family these days. I'd post a Con Report, but my brain is squishy and it's pretty much "saw people, talked a lot, wrote a bit, Johnny was awesome and I drank waaaay too much." Also, the new Harry Potter movie is intriguing - I've decided that in my universe, Harry Potter exists solely as the the movies and that way I'm happy. ;)
Something that probably is already doing the rounds is that this year is the last Dex-run Dexcon. [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] has been running these things for 12 years now and this year he announced his 'retirement'. This doesn't necessarily mean the end of the Con if someone(s) else want(s) to pick it up, but it does mean the end of Dex doing it.
I've got mixed feelings. My first Dexcon was Dexcon 3, back in 1998. Since then, I've been to every one, barring one year where I was moving to Canada any way and needed to save my money. In that time, I've met and made many friends, laughed, cried, laughed until I cried, wrote and just enjoyed being able to relax with like-minded folks. But I have noticed in these last few years an increasing feeling of dislocation, of being on the edges of things where once I was in the centre. Times change and people change with it and we are no exception, I guess, but it does make it harder to summon the enthusiasm I used to have. Seeing the numbers dwindle down also hasn't helped either, with that accentuating the sense that we were at the end of things.
Dex has, in my opinion, made a good choice. To let the con free to sink or swim under new management. To pass the torch, so to speak, and to see if people really want or need it enough to take up the challenge of running it. Sometimes you have to potentially lose something to know how important it is, and time will certainly tell if Dexcon has indeed run its course.
By the way, for those who might have wondered, Dex never called the con "Dexcon". That name was coined by the late [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] following the second actual gathering, as a joke, and the name's stuck ever since. Even if it has made Dex uncomfortable on many occasions. ;)
Something that probably is already doing the rounds is that this year is the last Dex-run Dexcon. [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] has been running these things for 12 years now and this year he announced his 'retirement'. This doesn't necessarily mean the end of the Con if someone(s) else want(s) to pick it up, but it does mean the end of Dex doing it.
I've got mixed feelings. My first Dexcon was Dexcon 3, back in 1998. Since then, I've been to every one, barring one year where I was moving to Canada any way and needed to save my money. In that time, I've met and made many friends, laughed, cried, laughed until I cried, wrote and just enjoyed being able to relax with like-minded folks. But I have noticed in these last few years an increasing feeling of dislocation, of being on the edges of things where once I was in the centre. Times change and people change with it and we are no exception, I guess, but it does make it harder to summon the enthusiasm I used to have. Seeing the numbers dwindle down also hasn't helped either, with that accentuating the sense that we were at the end of things.
Dex has, in my opinion, made a good choice. To let the con free to sink or swim under new management. To pass the torch, so to speak, and to see if people really want or need it enough to take up the challenge of running it. Sometimes you have to potentially lose something to know how important it is, and time will certainly tell if Dexcon has indeed run its course.
By the way, for those who might have wondered, Dex never called the con "Dexcon". That name was coined by the late [Bad username or site: @ livejournal.com] following the second actual gathering, as a joke, and the name's stuck ever since. Even if it has made Dex uncomfortable on many occasions. ;)
