Turning ten...
Jan. 11th, 2008 03:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hmpfI'm turning ten in fandom this year.
Being the obsessive-compulsive type that I am, I've kept records of my beginnings in fandom. A bit odd, that, because back then I was still fairly convinced it would only be a short, transitory type of madness, and not a lasting and defining feature of my life. Why did I feel a need to keep records of it, then? Guess some part of me knew better already. (I'd been obsessive about things before - it's always been a feature of my psyche, really - but it had always been a solitary thing, and something I was vaguely ashamed of. I never sought out a community. Tried, and without exception failed, to win friends over, yes, but never tried to find people who were already into something I was into.)
I have my first print-out from the net, dated 4.3.98, in a big rinbinder, along with a lot of other material - years later ironically titled 'Hmpf - the early years': first posts to the old Rysher HL forum and the MacMINT asylum, drafts for posts (back then I could only go online once a week for an hour or so, so I thought *very* well about what I wanted to say), notes about obsession in general, notes for my old, (in)famous Methos essay (published 1999, I think, on my first website). Oh, my painfully awkward English. *g*
Maybe I can get some of my old Methos drawings from that period scanned tonight or tomorrow. I'm going to visit my parents, and they have a scanner. It would be fitting to put them up this year. Not that they're very good, they really aren't - portraiture = not my strong point! - but they're part of my history. (And they're no worse than 90% of the fanart out there, really.)
1998 was an exciting year, the year a lot of my preconceptions about myself toppled. I entered fandom so convinced that I was better than most people in it; I'd totally bought into the pathologising mainstream view of it. I still entered it, because, like a junkie, I needed my Methos fix (not fic - not yet *g*). But I felt vaguely guilty, and a bit dirty, and very, very confused, those first few times. Also, very disconnected from everybody else - I *couldn't* be like them, could I?
Thankfully I'm not *terminally* dense, so I noticed fairly soon that fandom was... different. Different from what I'd expected - much *better* than I'd expected. Much more fun; much more intelligent; much more *subversive*. I discovered fic, and it boggled my mind, in the best possible way. I discovered communities (the old Highlander fandom clans) and forums and began to interact, awkwardly, with the people of this strange culture I'd discovered. (It would take years for that awkwardness to disappear completely.) I experienced for the first time the kindness of strangers that is so characteristic of fandom - a HL fan named Jean sent me copies of her Methos eps. (She died of cancer a few years ago. I hadn't kept in touch with her, because back then I was still figuring out how much distance and closeness were acceptable on the net. I regret that now.)
I fell in love with fandom, little by little. By 1999 I wasn't ashamed of calling myself a fan anymore; by 2000 I was proud.
And today? Well, I wouldn't be who I am without fandom. I probably wouldn't be writing. I would have far fewer friends. I would still obsess, because that's hardwired, but I'd do it in solitude, and feel ashamed about it. And I wouldn't be so *creative* about it.
On the other hand, I might be more creative in other areas of my life - I might still be painting - because the need for creativity, too, seems to be hardwired. However, I don't regret putting so much of my creative energy into fandom, because it's *nice* to have a creative outlet that isn't solitary. (And, ultimately, I think I am better at writing than I am at painting. Painting always felt like 'just a hobby'. Writing, on the other hand, on the better days feels like a vocation.)
I would be more 'respectable' without fandom, no doubt. My less respectable urges would be nicely sequestered away, invisible, as they are for most people.
My parents wouldn't find me so baffling. There wouldn't be so many essential parts of me that they can't understand - or rather, there would, but, as before I found fandom, they wouldn't be visible. There wouldn't be an invisible culture gap in my life. Only the gap between what I am and what I show people of me, the gap that exists in the lives of most 'normal' people.
I also probably wouldn't be on the internet, because fandom was the only reason I bought my first computer in 1999. *g*
Being the obsessive-compulsive type that I am, I've kept records of my beginnings in fandom. A bit odd, that, because back then I was still fairly convinced it would only be a short, transitory type of madness, and not a lasting and defining feature of my life. Why did I feel a need to keep records of it, then? Guess some part of me knew better already. (I'd been obsessive about things before - it's always been a feature of my psyche, really - but it had always been a solitary thing, and something I was vaguely ashamed of. I never sought out a community. Tried, and without exception failed, to win friends over, yes, but never tried to find people who were already into something I was into.)
I have my first print-out from the net, dated 4.3.98, in a big rinbinder, along with a lot of other material - years later ironically titled 'Hmpf - the early years': first posts to the old Rysher HL forum and the MacMINT asylum, drafts for posts (back then I could only go online once a week for an hour or so, so I thought *very* well about what I wanted to say), notes about obsession in general, notes for my old, (in)famous Methos essay (published 1999, I think, on my first website). Oh, my painfully awkward English. *g*
Maybe I can get some of my old Methos drawings from that period scanned tonight or tomorrow. I'm going to visit my parents, and they have a scanner. It would be fitting to put them up this year. Not that they're very good, they really aren't - portraiture = not my strong point! - but they're part of my history. (And they're no worse than 90% of the fanart out there, really.)
1998 was an exciting year, the year a lot of my preconceptions about myself toppled. I entered fandom so convinced that I was better than most people in it; I'd totally bought into the pathologising mainstream view of it. I still entered it, because, like a junkie, I needed my Methos fix (not fic - not yet *g*). But I felt vaguely guilty, and a bit dirty, and very, very confused, those first few times. Also, very disconnected from everybody else - I *couldn't* be like them, could I?
Thankfully I'm not *terminally* dense, so I noticed fairly soon that fandom was... different. Different from what I'd expected - much *better* than I'd expected. Much more fun; much more intelligent; much more *subversive*. I discovered fic, and it boggled my mind, in the best possible way. I discovered communities (the old Highlander fandom clans) and forums and began to interact, awkwardly, with the people of this strange culture I'd discovered. (It would take years for that awkwardness to disappear completely.) I experienced for the first time the kindness of strangers that is so characteristic of fandom - a HL fan named Jean sent me copies of her Methos eps. (She died of cancer a few years ago. I hadn't kept in touch with her, because back then I was still figuring out how much distance and closeness were acceptable on the net. I regret that now.)
I fell in love with fandom, little by little. By 1999 I wasn't ashamed of calling myself a fan anymore; by 2000 I was proud.
And today? Well, I wouldn't be who I am without fandom. I probably wouldn't be writing. I would have far fewer friends. I would still obsess, because that's hardwired, but I'd do it in solitude, and feel ashamed about it. And I wouldn't be so *creative* about it.
On the other hand, I might be more creative in other areas of my life - I might still be painting - because the need for creativity, too, seems to be hardwired. However, I don't regret putting so much of my creative energy into fandom, because it's *nice* to have a creative outlet that isn't solitary. (And, ultimately, I think I am better at writing than I am at painting. Painting always felt like 'just a hobby'. Writing, on the other hand, on the better days feels like a vocation.)
I would be more 'respectable' without fandom, no doubt. My less respectable urges would be nicely sequestered away, invisible, as they are for most people.
My parents wouldn't find me so baffling. There wouldn't be so many essential parts of me that they can't understand - or rather, there would, but, as before I found fandom, they wouldn't be visible. There wouldn't be an invisible culture gap in my life. Only the gap between what I am and what I show people of me, the gap that exists in the lives of most 'normal' people.
I also probably wouldn't be on the internet, because fandom was the only reason I bought my first computer in 1999. *g*
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Date: 2008-01-13 01:48 am (UTC)It's so interesting how differently we all got into fandom. I think I joined the HL Rhysher forum -- my first experience with fandom -- about a year after you did. But since I didn't pay any attention, I'm not sure if it was '99 or '00. ::runs to check:: Well, my Reunion T-shirt says May 2000, and I went just a year after finding Rysher, so I guess it was 1999.
Regardless, I was completely clueless about fandom when I wandered in -- I just discovered there was this group of people on the internet who were discussing HL, and I had nobody in my area to talk to about it, so I settled in and had a ball.
You're right -- the people of fandom are all kinds of awesome -- exuberant and creative and kind (usually) and friendly and, best of all, inclusive. If you're a fan of their source, you're welcomed with open arms, regardless of nationality, gender, color, socio-economic status, or anything else. Heady stuff. Through fandom, I talk to people all over the world, and I've been exposed to concepts and ideas that I never would have encountered in my small town America.
So, I do remember it was right around my birthday -- sometime in March -- and now I've decided it was 1999. So, I'm coming up on nine years old. <g> You and I are such babies; I know people who have been in fandom since before the internet, when the only way to read/share fanfiction was through 'zines. And yet, they still welcome newcomers with open arms. Yay fandom!
.
no subject
Date: 2008-06-07 07:58 am (UTC)Do you remember meeting up at the Christmas market in FFM? I was way more awkward than you, and oh so excited at the prospect of meeting up with a fellow fan. *g*
If you ask yourself where I'm popping up from suddenly, I've seen you around LJ comments on frriendsfriends and communities, and since I just went back to my own fandom roots (all those ficlets from the forum challenge...) I just thought I'd pop in and say hi!
Fandom and the internet can be such a small place...
Dinah