Musings on fandom, filk and friends

[marycrawford]

I was biking to work this morning in the sunshine, singing softly to myself, and halfway through the song it occurred to me that I was singing "Red Sky of Mourning". It's a filk song, lyrics by J. S. Cavalcante, and it's Spock's lament for killing Kirk in Amok Time. I heard it years ago at a British K/S con (the only media/slash con I ever attended) and got it on tape afterwards. It's a great song, although not really well suited for singing happily in the sun:

Set him as a star upon the sky
And I, as a black star, in his orbit keeping nigh
Together we shall our vigil keep
And all who behold us shall mourn and weep
And to their children shall explain
The tale of a brother by his brother slain

That's from memory, mind. And as I realized I was singing it, I thought "There's probably no one else in this country who knows this song." And I felt sorry for myself, being a lone and not very well connected fan.

Of course it may not be true, for certainly there are other Dutch media fans: I met a couple of the K/S fans (I started out as a K/S fan, and it will always have a place in my heart) and they loaned me zines and were altogether wonderful.

It's just that since I gradually faded out of active K/S fandom, I haven't met any other fans at all. I don't know anyone in real life who's an Iolaus fan, or a Due South fan, or even a Smallville fan, or who's willing to talk about subtext with me. And I must admit I do feel jealous at times, reading other people's LJs where it seems that they all know each other, have pyjama parties and Potter reading parties together and watch vids and so on.

But then I have to admit that I'm not much good at keeping up with mailing lists and Yahoo Groups and all that stuff, so that my fannish behavior tends to consist of reading, watching, flitting in and out of fandoms, and occasionally sending LOCS to authors I like or recommending stories. Standing on the sidelines, in other words.

And I can't be the only one standing there, not even in the Netherlands, can I? So if you're reading this and want to get in touch: let me know.

Comments

[ltlj.livejournal.com]

I started getting Star Wars fanzines back when I was in high school, but never was able to get to any cons or meet any other fans. It seemed like a world I could sort of peer into from the outside but not actively participate in. I didn't get to really meet any other SF/F fans until I went to college (and being able to talk about the books I was reading to people who had actually read them too was a huge revelation), but I didn't really get to connect with other media fans until internet access got popular. The first fan mailing list I was on was mainly a Blake's 7 list. I wasn't a Blake's 7 fan and had never even seen the show, but at least there were was fanfic. I remember how excited I was when the friends I met through sending letters of comment to SW fanzines got email addresses and we could communicate at will. Basically, thank god for the internet. Being able to keep up and share things with your friends in Australia, the UK, Russia, or at the opposite end of the country now feels so essential, I don't know how I got along without it.