I was looking over the message boards(which as anyone can tell you I don’t do enough) and it made me realize something about me and my relationship with Dragoncon. I rely on the con a lot in my life. It is my main vacation every year and my main interaction with many of the people I consider friends. Many of these friends I only get to see for that one magical week. I am able to keep in contact with some of these friends through the rest of the year but my schedule makes it impossible to keep up with all of them and even some of them(whose identities will remain anonymous) that I try and stay in touch with flat ignore me. So you can see why I love this week so much. Also, it is still 7 weeks away and I am already thinking about it almost everyday.

The second thought that came to me was a slightly odd one. It finally hit home that I won’t be the guy running Harris anymore. I feel that a form of identity has been given away with this much needed break. I don’t quite know how to handle this. I love that I have an opportunity to try something new but I wonder will I be anything other than a wallflower. Like I was my first year. Running Harris gave me an identity at con. It gave me something to do. A place that I know my presence mattered.

I don’t understand this duality in my head. I can’t wait to go but I don’t really know what I will do. Even if I do nothing it will be worth it to see everyone, I just don’t know if I will feel I earned my badge. We will find out I guess.

For most of us we live with this as something seen on the news or read in a paper. That little bubble around me was suspended last night. I have seen my share of violent things happen at work. Muggings, beatings, and assaults. Customers attack other customers in theaters and out in front more frequently than I would like. It has never happened to one of the people put in my care. I can’t help but feel partly responsible for what happened. I received a call from the theater last night with a frantic message that one of my assistants had been attacked. I rushed to the theater to find him being attended to by medical personnel. Without going into specifics due to a pending police investigation, he was attacked for what seems to be little to no reason. Not robbed or threatened, just beaten. Thankfully he will be ok.

It has been quite awhile since my last post and I was sitting here thinking it would be a good idea to get started back up again. I have been pretty busy over the past few months with moving, Dragoncon and starting at the new theater. Now that the holidays are done and everything is slowing down again I find myself with a few more spare minutes to complete things like this. I returned for Huntsville and PHE a few days ago and it was a nice trip. I got to see my friends and get a few days away from work, but even that caused some problems anyway. There was a car accident that caused a power outage at the theater on Saturday night, which was very hard to try and deal with over the phone but we seemed to handle it the best we could.
I returned home in a somber mood to be leaving all of my friends behind. No matter where they live it is hard to leave them when the time comes each time. I hope they all know how much they mean to me and what it is to get to seem them.
People say home is where the heart is, which I guess makes me lucky because I have three homes then. A part of it never left Colorado when I moved away, another part lives in Huntsville with my friends there and lastly in Atlanta. I will close by saying I feel more at hom in those three places than I do here. This place is just for work. The count down begins till I can hold you all in my sight again.
“far away boys, far away boys, away from you now.”