Exhibiting signs of age…

Last December, Dawn and I made our first convention appearance since the COVID pandemic began. It was relatively small and very local and we did okay for the amount of “ring rust” we’d accumulated. Then a few months later we did WonderCon, and that was definitely rough on our stamina at points, not to mention our cat unexpectedly started having epileptic seizures and I almost sent Dawn off solo because of that. But we persevered, possibly thanks in large part to Comic-Con International extending their free drayage program to WonderCon for the first time (that basically means they assist you with load-in and load-out).

Next up was going to be Midsummer Scream at the end of July, which we signed up for back in 2020 to try out after we had been put back on the waitlist for Small Press at SDCC and had decided screw it, we’re just going to go to SDCC as pro attendees and also show our visiting niece around since she hadn’t quite turned 13 yet so was eligible for a free child badge.

Of course we all know what happened next, and as the conventions started poking their heads back out two years later the landscape had definitely changed, as was (unintentionally) reinforced by SDCC when they rolled over our guest badge choices from 2020 and… oh, hey, my mom was one of them. Oof.

My niece was now too old for a child badge, of course, and also not as interested in coming down from Washington State. Just as well since SDCC then also did the thing again where we did get called off their wait list for exhibiting, and even got offered the same placement as we had in 2019. Dawn and I talked and we decided to do something which was probably nucking futs of us, which was accepting that and thus setting up a scenario where we had a marathon convention to do, and then just a few days later would do another three days at the Scream.

SDCC also ended up offering Dawn a table in Artist’s Alley at the last minute, and that offer we declined since we were already feeling pretty stretched thin. We’re considered pros but we’re not pros, you know? We did a circuit but not in the way friends of ours do where they’re going out to New York, Atlanta, Chicago and somehow staying sane and whole.

It’s like, I didn’t even start with the exhibiting thing until I was well over 30, and though Dawn is younger than me she’s still got some mileage on her. Now I’m pushing 50 years old and I wonder if exhibiting is a younger man’s game. Again, we do have good friends of similar age who do the big circuit and make it work, but doing the circuit is their actual job. They’ve literally done things like changing their sleep schedules to acclimate for evening shows, which is not quite like base camp at Mt. Everest but still  above and beyond how the average person would prep. And this year too I’ve seen some people who have been successful for years showing signs of breakdown, either physical, mental, or both. Is convention exhibiting akin to a sport where you only have so many good years in you before you’re out to pasture, so to speak?

I’m a terrible control sample, though. I have bad feet, I’m diabetic, I’m allergic to a distressingly wide range of flora… hell I need a machine just to breathe freely at night. Beyond that I’m not psychologically fond of traveling, either, at least not where I have to pack a bunch of things. Honestly it’s a wonder I get out of the house at all, much less that I came out alive from this recent bout of back-to-back conventioneering. I survived, obviously (or I’d be a literal ghost writer) but I definitely felt beat up.

Likely part of it is a matter of training and conditioning, but man, I sure feel a lot more tired a lot more of the time than I did 10 years ago, to say nothing of my teens or twenties where staying up until 2am playing TTRPGs with my friends was just the time for us all to go out to Denny’s or some other 24 hour venue and have “dinner.”

Anyhow, this isn’t meant to discourage anyone from convention lyfe, but if you can get started sooner than later, that’s probably for the best. And here’s hoping that by the time your mind and body’s warranties decide they’ve expireed, you’re rich and/or famous enough to have assistants!