Welcome to my perfumed garden

I’ve been musing a lot on fandom of late – what it used to mean and what it means now. I’ve spent time over the weekend, talking about it with another old fandom-friend who feels much the same and think the time has come for me to bare my breast and bottom to the snowy wastes and admit that  my fandom glory days are probably past.

I’m still writing fic. I’ve actually been writing the same fic for over a year now (it’s very long!). I should finally finish that in the spring, but it’ll almost certainly be my last. I’m not saying that for sure, but the probability is very high. it’s just not where the love lies right now. I’m busy writing a new novel, all my creative energies are going into that and there really isn’t room for much else.

I only really have one fandom and that’s The Sentinel. Jim and Blair will always live in my head and heart but I don’t really want to write about them and only them any more. I haven’t watched an episode in a long time; I can’t seem to bring myself to engage in fandom discussions.

As for fandom in general, I’ve had half-hearted stabs at some of the other stuff around and I have to say that the shows creating the loudest squee on LJ right now do nothing for me at all. There are plenty of shows I enjoy, but nothing I feel fannish about, which is why I have to assume, like my Great-Fandom-Mate, who just took all her pix and posters down, that the fandom party is over for me - for now at least. Who can say what the future holds?
 
I’m not bowing out of fandom completely, but at best, I’m only going to be drifting on the margins. I’d guess most of the people on my flist friended me because of my fic or my website and that’s why I’m here, making this post, saying; if you feel we no longer have anything much in common and you don’t want to have to skip over me rambling on about my novel and my life, I won’t blame you one tiny little bit if you want to knock me off your Flist.

Likewise, I'm engaged in a little gentle pruning myself. With a few particular exceptions, I'm dropping people who never friended me back. For me, LJ is a mutual feast, a wonderful toing and froing and if you don't friend me back, we can't really engage. So, if you've found yourself dropped from my flist and want to stay, please friend me and I'll friend you back .

I’ve had fabulous times and made wonderful friends. Many, many people on LJ are now friends in every sense of the word. You know who you are; we might have come to know each other through fandom but that friendship has broadened into something far deeper. I haven’t actually met that many of you, but you’re better friends for the most part than the people I deal with in so-called real life.

But anyone who’s only been here for the fic and the fandom and who, in the light of all the above wants to go now, please feel free, with a hug and a blessing and a kiss to the cheek for auld lang syne.

It’s been great knowing every single one of you. XXX