RTBTCKI I had a Hat…
Posted By Kathleen David on January 30, 2020
There is an episode of Dinosaurs entitled ‘When Food Goes Bad’. In it the parents go out on a date leaving the kids home alone for the first time since Granny went to the casino. These are Dinosaurs so the appetizer is a live mammal looking thing. At one point, Earl puts the appetizer in his mouth and then does a spit take. The appetizer turns to him and say, “I had a hat” and Earl spits out the hat. And that’s not the best part of the episode.
Wednesday night Peter and I have our bowling league and we leave Caroline home alone. We worked toward this over time and now I feel safe leaving her home alone. I am working on making sure she has the life skills she needs so when she goes off into the world, she can take care of herself.
Working out the day. Yesterday was productive and I would like to continue the trend.
A vocal minority who are either trolls or haters in several fandoms are not giving me happy feelings these days. I keep telling myself this is not all fandom and, for the most part, fandom is more than happy to see more of what they love. Also, the gatekeepers need to go. I really don’t care where you are stepping into the fandom, you are a fan. There is not a litmus test to prove one is a true fan. And fans don’t have to like everything within a fandom. This all or nothing idea which has permeated some of the longer running fandoms is not a good thing. I believe in the joy of fandom. I believe in the fun of sharing what one loves about a fandom with others. I am tired of watching others stomp on that fun and joy. I can remember as a young fan there were a set of fans that looked down on us as almost an annoyance. I swore I would never do that to another fan. Young blood is the only way a fandom grows. I have watched fandoms fade into almost nothing because the gatekeepers didn’t think anyone else was good enough to join.
I do like that creating costumes for going to conventions is now considered pretty normal. I like that I can find materials I could not back in the day. I love seeing what others have discovered about what can be done on the cheap. I love learning and teaching others how to make cool stuff. This is a group who shares because they want others to know how they did it and encourages people to join in. Are there bad eggs, yeah but I think that is true for any group. Are there some holier than thou? Yep, but they are in the minority. The community I know goes out of their way to promote costuming for everyone.
In fact, I love that things I was a fan of when I was a teen are now main-stream. The nerds won and a lot of people are admitting that they were closet fans too. Wearing a Marvel tie to work is no longer frowned on. Talking about going to a convention is becoming normal water cooler talk. It has gone from a majority of straight white males to everyone. I love seeing families strolling around a convention and each one is there because of their love of a fandom. That a woman working at a comic book shop is not a strange occurrence.
I am grateful for inclusive fandoms.
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