Uncategorized

One of the things that fascinated me at Ad Astra was watching the dynamics of conversations. I had plenty of chances because the whole weekend was filled with them, whether they were the formalized conversations of a panel discussion, or the informal conversations that occurred spontaneously in the hallways. I was paying particular attention to how conversations are born, grow, break-up, or die because I have not always been good at it. I still remember being at a convention in April of 2005 and fleeing to my room in tears because I didn’t know how to talk to strangers when Howard was not around. I’ve learned a lot since then. I’m still not an expert, but I want to sort some of my thoughts and see if I can make sense of it all.

One thing that I’ve learned about people is that everyone has stories to tell, even if they don’t think that they’re interesting. All you have to do is find the right opener and people start to spill stories. Each story usually contains several further openers. I grab them and mentally hold on to them in case the conversation should flag later and I need a new direction. I’ve had lots of conversations with amazing people who didn’t think they were very special. They felt ordinary, but they’d done things I have not, and it was delightful to listen as they spoke about it.

Conversations are very much like living things. They have to be nurtured and they can be killed by unskilled handling. A key element in being a good conversationalist is know what not to say. I’m not just talking about faux pas, but also about simple thoughts and possible threads for conversation. My rule of thumb is to divide my thoughts by the number of people participating in the conversation. If there are two people, then I only going to get to say half of the things I think of to say. If there are three, then I only going to get to say about one thought out of three. Like any rule of thumb, this is very flexible. In a conversation between five people, two may dominate the conversation for awhile, but as the topic drifts the other three may have more to say.

Dominance in conversation is a topic unto itself. There are some people who will take control of almost any conversation that they enter. This can be either enjoyable or frustrating depending on if you enjoy listening to the dominant person. Several times during the weekend I noticed guests of honor holding “court.” This would generally be a larger conversation of 5-10 people, but the famous person did most of the talking. This kind of conversation occurs when most of the participants are in awe of one particular participant. Then everyone seems content to just listen to whatever that one person has to say. I pointed out the phenomenon to Howard, he nodded and said that he “holds court” sometimes too. Howard is very much an entertainer in conversations. He stands right up and fills the conversation with stories and anecdotes, virtually guaranteeing that the conversation won’t flag. My conversational style is different. I have my own share of stories and anecdotes, but I almost prefer getting other people to talk so that I can just listen. Listening is far less exhausting than talking. This tendency of mine is part of the reason I was so socially dependent on Howard for so many years. If I was with him I was guaranteed to have someone who would keep conversations from devolving into awkward silence. I’m pleased to say that I was not dependent on Howard for conversational help at Ad Astra. I talked to lots of people and enjoyed doing it.

As is typical in almost any social situation, there were conversations that did not interest me, or that I was otherwise interested in ducking out of. There is an art to gracefully ending or leaving a conversation, particularly if there are only two people involved. I’m not sure I have this one down yet, but I’m starting to see how it works. I’m also starting to see how to introduce people to each other and help them strike up a conversation. These are extremely useful hostessing skills. We expect to be doing book release parties for years to come and I’m going to need lots of hostessing skills to make that work well.

Saturday night at the convention was in full swing. A klingon in full regalia was discussing Harry Potter with slave princess Leia. A procession of corseted figures had just gone past, headed for the dance. The bar was full of authors and aspiring authors solving the problems of the world over drinks. Downstairs the filk had just begun. The conversation in which I’d been taking part had just broken up as some people headed off for bed. Howard had been shanghaied into a Shadowrun LARP. I took a moment to step away from the bustle and just watch. I retreated to an otherwise unoccupied balcony that gave me a view of convention central.

I stood, unnoticed, and watched the bustle below. I became aware of a subtle unease inside myself. Below me were dozens of people very different from myself. They were publicly doing things that I choose not to do. Near me was a table with flyers, some of which explained or defended alternative lifestyles. I live in a community where 80% of the population shares my religion and moral code. It was definitely a “not in Kansas anymore” moment. I had several of those throughout the convention. Usually they hit me when I had a moment alone to think.

I only stayed aside from the bustle for a short while. It is good to acknowledge the subtle discomfort, but it does not drive my actions. I’m gad that it does not. I had many fascinating conversations with people who made me feel subtly uncomfortable. I learned a lot about different ways of thinking and the motivations behind the choices that are different from my own. Sometimes the discussions made the discomfort disappear, sometimes it did not. In quiet times later I was able to analyze and try to sort my reactions.

In contrast, there were many people with whom I was instantly, and completely, comfortable. That is always a joy to discover. It is very happy to go to a new place and to find friends waiting for you there. Interestingly, physical appearance was not a particularly good predictor for whether or not I would feel comfortable.

At one point during the convention I had a conversation with someone who was describing a friend as “very religious.” I listened to the description and it sounded perfectly normal to me. Where I live it is very common for people to attend church every Sunday, to pray over every meal, to pray daily as a family, to pray before bed, to read scriptures daily, and to live a moral code which includes behavioral and dietary guidelines. Being at Ad Astra and listening to people there, I realized that to most of them my life would seam zealously religious. The comparison was fascinating to me and it gave me a chance to glimpse my life from another viewpoint.

One of the most obvious manifestations of this differentness came up in discussions of children. I always got a reaction when I mentioned that I have four(!) kids. In Utah families with 5 or 6 kids are common. A family with four is considered average. At Ad Astra I did not talk parenting with a single person who had more than three kids. By the end of the convention I began to feel than mentioning the number my kids was either bragging or a confession of lunacy. No one person ever implied this, it was just an aggregation of all the reactions all weekend long.

All of it together made me realize that living outside of Utah would be a challenge for me. Here, I am very comfortable. My choices about life and parenting are right in the center of normal. If I were to live somewhere else, I would stick out, be different. That position is inherently difficult. I would have to be strong to remain who I am when it is different from others. The thought makes me question my motives for choosing to live where I am comfortable. Not that I’m going to move any time soon. Our roots here are deep. Going somewhere else would be a major upheaval for us all.

The experience brings home to me that I need to be alert and aware of the people who live near me who are not part of the local cultural majority. They are outside the norm either by religion, or language, racial heritage, or lifestyle. As part of the majority I have a responsibility to see them and accept them for who they are. I have a responsibility to not treat them like they are invisible or irrelevant. I have a responsibility to reach out and find our similarities rather than our differences. I felt vaguely different at Ad Astra, but I never once felt alienated, because people were far more interested in finding points of connection than in defending their choices. I need to do that for the cultural minorities in my community.

Thoughts and experiences such as I sort in this blog entry are a major reason why I love going to conventions. While sorting these thoughts, I’ve come to the conclusion that it does no harm for me to live in a place where I am in the cultural majority, so long as I do not hide there. I need to keep going to places and meeting people that are outside my comfort zone. That is good for me, so long as I do not participate in activities that are outside my moral code. Conventions like Ad Astra are ideal for this.

Next to the elevator in the hotel there was a sign that said in large letters “Upon discovery of fire” followed by smaller print detailing evacuation plans. Howard pointed out the sign and declared his desire to tape a new message underneath the bold inscription so that the sign would read: “Upon discovery of fire, invent civilization.”

I spent all weekend talking to people who are very focused on writing fiction. There were lots of discussions of writers block, and daily word counts, and sneaking time to write. Usually this kind of discussion is both inspiring and guilt inducing. I come out of a convention weekend full of ideas and ready to tackle new stories. That did not happen this time. I do not have time to schedule writing into my life right now. If a free moment and inspiration strike at the same time, then I will write, but otherwise I will not. This is okay because there will be a time in my future when I can schedule writing time. Just because I am not writing now, does not mean I will never write again. Failing to write is not a tragedy so long as I choose something more important to me. The writing will be waiting for me when I emerge from this busy time in my life.

The “Education Benefits of Video Games” panel veered into the territory of good parenting. There was a thought I did not get the chance to express in the panel, but it is a good thought which I don’t want to forget: If my children never choose to do something that makes me uncomfortable, then I have failed as a parent because they have not learned to think for themselves.

I got to attend parts of two book launches during the course of the convention. Both launches featured convention games where attendees ran around finding clues to solve puzzles and win prizes at the launch party. I’d never seen that done before and it was a neat way to do it. It probably works best when the book launch is part of a convention, although I suppose it might be possible to run the game online before a non-convention launch. I don’t think it is something I will ever do though. I am too over-stressed with book shipping, and party arranging, to put the effort into running a game as well. Both of the Ad Astra book launches were in a presentation/book signing format. Ours have been more of a party/open house format. I suspect we’ll mostly stick to the latter because it requires fewer functioning braincells and those are in short supply when I’m exhausted from a shipping event. I do think we’ll try to have party prizes of some sort though. That was neat.

In the dealer’s room, there was one artist who had simply gorgeous painted sculptures of fantasy creatures. The phoenix and the dragons particularly caught my eye. I talked to her for a minute or two about her process. She’s just graduated from school and is making ends meet with the income from her art. I hope she continues to be able to do so. Her work is simply beautiful, you should go look at it. www.creaturesfromel.ca

I spent all weekend being business person, author, public speaker. Those are sides of me that do not get much exercise in my daily life. Now I am back home and switching gears has not been as easy as I anticipated. The convention lingers in my brain. I changed and grew this weekend in some subtle ways and I’m having to do a little work to settle back in.

This morning the business person was still ascendant. She had tasks to accomplish, things to get done. By late afternoon the introvert and the writer had staged a coup. For the past hour or more I’ve been holed up in my bedroom writing blog entries. I’m not going to flood friends’ pages by posting them all at once. I’ll space them out instead. So far there are three in addition to the three I’ve already posted and this one which I will go ahead and post today. That is seven entries so far, and I’ve still got more thoughts to sort.