Storytelling

[yourlibrarian]

I decided to start with my flashiest photo, which also happens to be chronological in more ways than one. As a tween, I adored Shaun Cassidy, but back then it was tough to find information on celebrity activities, particularly once they left the pages of teen magazines. I picked up news here and there over the years (I loved American Gothic) but it was only years after I had been online that I thought to see what I might find about him. By that time he was no longer performing but was working as a writer/producer.

A few years ago when I had to reset Twitter subscriptions after an account hack, I thought to see if he had one. He did and uses it regularly. That's how I found out about his decision to do some one-off concerts, 40 years after his last one. After talking with a friend from California, she offered to meet me in Vegas for a long weekend. So I booked the trip late in November.

The concert was in mid-February. By then, news of Covid had been out for a few weeks, but thanks to our administration, news was spreading slowly and there were as yet no restrictions. The few cases in the U.S. sounded isolated. I was concerned given I was flying and going to a concert, but the bigger concern was that my friend had last minute work changes and a snowstorm was expected the day before I was to fly. I wasn't sure the trip would happen for other reasons.

The snow didn't ground the plane after all, but it wasn't until I was at the airport that my friend had to back out. Even though for one reason or another I'd flown somewhere every year of my life, this was to mark only the second time I'd ever taken a trip without meeting anyone at the destination. As it happens, the first time I ever did was when I was a teen flying across the country to a fan con. It was for my next fandom after Shaun.

While waiting to fly out, one of the Southwest gates had been decorated for Black History Month and had a live DJ playing Motown and disco tunes. At one point 12 people were line dancing in the walkway. It's hard to imagine that sort of light heartedness now. I spent most of the trip by myself, and in the hotel rooms, partly to reduce risk. I had no idea that it was going to be the last time I'd go out and do anything for more than a year.

The concert was borne of last chances in other ways. Although he stopped short of stating it outright, it was clear that the death of his half-brother David had spurred Shaun into action, in not delaying something he wanted to do. But he worried about starting up the craziness again, as the performing was the only thing he missed about his teen idol days. And he reminded the audience, he had been chased, stalked, had his car attacked, and had his hair pulled out. His audience had scared him.

Some probably still might, but most of the audience wasn't much younger than he is. It was surprisingly nostalgic to hear the old numbers, like the feeling of running into somebody who knows the same obscure songs as you. I was especially thrilled to hear songs that I never heard performed before. He also had one new one, written for the audience, called "If This Is the Last Song I Ever Write." It had this wonderful line:

"If what the poets say is true, my love will live on in you."

As utterly devoted to him as I was as a tween, that little bit felt like he had finally said something back to me after all those years. It's so true of fandom generally, that our love for things enables them to keep on existing. We've lost a lot of people this year, but our love for some of them will keep theirs going.



Jigsaw puzzles have been all the rage this year, but we had 8 of them here already. One I had tried working on over last Christmas with the friend I didn't see in Vegas. The one above had been in my bag during the Vegas trip. I'd picked it up along with 5 others in January in post-holiday sales. The larger ones had been planned for doing at home over Independence Day and Christmas. The smaller ones, for hanging out with friends during visits where we could complete it in 2-3 days.

I almost chose the photo of the Star Wars puzzle, because this is the year I got into SW fandom for the first time. I had been a fan of the original trilogy but fellow fans were harder to find pre-Internet, and I knew little about any other canon content until the prequel trilogy came along – which killed my interest dead. It wasn't until I started watching Star Wars Rebels last year that I realized I could get very interested in the verse after all. Then in 2020, the first year of Disney+, we watched all the SW content made so far. So I was able to start reading fanfic, which has been quite enjoyable.

But I chose the puzzle above because I put it together by myself. It's been amazing having my SO home so much (I work from home). However he's been painfully busy, working twice as much this year as last due to all the changes (he teaches and also does administrative work). He had no time off this summer, instead going from stress-filled 70+ hour weeks to just 40 for 6 weeks before ramping up again. We worked on 3 puzzles together, me more than him, until this last one he didn't have time for at all.

My daily life hasn't changed much this year but I've gotten accustomed to having him home. While I want everyone to be safe again and for businesses to reopen and I would love to travel again, the fact is that I wish that he could keep working at home from here on out. Because 2020 certainly showed that we can be together yet alone, but it's better than being alone most of the time.



There's nothing particularly special about our Christmas tree, but this Christmas was different for several reasons.

My SO and I always travel for Christmas – him to visit family and me to visit friends. This was the first holiday we'd spent together since 1999.

We do, however, always decorate for Christmas because the holiday is a big deal to him and a tree is a must. He is very nostalgic for anything done at Christmas during his childhood, and reading beneath a tree is one of those things.

Mostly though, I feel very fortunate that we've made it through the year without being infected and still being ok in other ways. As there are more studies about the early days of the pandemic, I realize how easily I could have been exposed in February, or for that matter the early days of March at home when I still went to the grocery unmasked and we met to go bowling with our league. We might very well not have been celebrating anything last month, as we both know multiple people who have been infected, and in fact the Whack a Mole nature of infections has been part of what's made my SO's job so difficult this year.

But before the new year, we had a glimpse of how much more difficult things could have been. Our Internet was out for two days, and aside from the drawn out effort to get it restored, we found getting anything done twice as hard. And when it was working, what we expected to be a quiet time of just relaxing together was surprisingly busy, both in terms of our trying to get things done that we'd been putting off until we had time to plan and discuss, and in terms of meeting online with family and friends.

These meetings have been great – fun and energizing. But it made me wish that they could happen throughout the year, both so that every month could have some social time, and so that we weren't coming out of this two week period with a to-do list of things we couldn't get done during a slow time. Because neither of us expects the first half of 2021 to be significantly different from most of 2020.

Comments

[thenewbuzwuzz]

*mashes kudos button* I enjoyed your commentary. The first photo is very pretty! Your internet was out for two whole days?! D:

[yourlibrarian]

Thanks! And yes, it was a long and frustrating story which I detailed in a blog post. It happening at the end of the holidays was probably fortunate in that we weren't deprived of reunions but the first workdays weren't particularly busy either. 💻

[weofodthignen]

We have that jigsaw puzzle!

What a year. I'm so glad you're both ok, and I take it your friends have all recovered?

I like the one of your tree, the fragile baubles floating in a cloud of white :-)

[yourlibrarian]

Hah! It was inevitable that someone would, I think, as it seems to be a widely distributed series. It was just the right sort of challenge for me to do alone as well.

Yes, our friends and family have, though we have been one step removed from one who did not and my SO has colleagues who have lost people. As this marches on, I suspect few of us will be more than two degrees from a loss.

Thanks! Especially if we change our holiday setup I tend to take photos but generally not detailed pictures of the tree itself so that was especially for this set 🎄

[beer_good_foamy]

As utterly devoted to him as I was as a tween, that little bit felt like he had finally said something back to me after all those years.

I love it when that happens, that connection between performer and audience. Sounds like a good last concert to have gone to (for now).

Great post, thank you!

[yourlibrarian]

Glad you enjoyed! And yes, it was an unexpected opportunity in a year where "unexpected" took on new meaning 👨‍🎤

[rose_griffes]

Lovely to read all of this, and I really like that last pic.

[yourlibrarian]

Thanks very much 😊

Shaum Cassidy and the Bew Normal

[z_note]

I can't believe that it was only a year ago that Shaun Cassidy performed in Las Vegas. The gulf between Shaun's evocation of  The hardy Boys and our new normal seems impossible.  How did we ever get here?  

Re: Shaum Cassidy and the Bew Normal

[yourlibrarian]

As the Grateful Dead said, "It's been a long strange trip." Yeah, it's been almost a year now since the show and virtually everything about it gives me the heebie jeebies -- flying, Vegas, a concert in a hotel ballroom, meals at buffets, different hotel rooms, shuttles. Meanwhile Mike got the first vaccine shot yesterday so by the time the concert anniversary happens he'll have the second. That's rather miraculous.

[wherdafux_d_cat]

Nice summation of the year in pics and text. And I mean 'nice' as in 'nailed it!' :)

[yourlibrarian]

Haha, thanks!

[mxcatmoon]

You got a great last trip before those things became taboo, at least. Love the puzzle, and the tree. I had a white tree once. It was my favorite. Looks so pretty.

Hopefully this misery will be over soon. Sometimes I despair that this way of life will ever end, but I have hope that eventually the vaccine will do it's job (once that finally manage to get it moving faster).

[yourlibrarian]

True!

White trees were my favorite since I was little when I saw one at a friend's house. Growing up we always had real trees which are lauded for their scent. But my own sense of smell is poor, the trees shed, and the needles could be prickly when one was decorating it. You'd also have to figure out how to get it home and lug it in and out. Plus you'd have to keep it watered and even so it would start drying out in the dry conditions.

By comparison I love white trees because everything but silver and (obviously) white stands out well against it, and it tends to make the tree even brighter in low light because the white reflects the lights so well. And while a bare artificial tree is rather unlovely, it certainly makes setting up and taking down much quicker and easier and the trees can last over 10 years.

[mxcatmoon]

Had a real tree one year. Was still finding needles in the shag carpeting 5 years later! LOL.