  We suppose it's only natural that people we
correspond with think of us as fanzine fans, since that's how many of you have come to
know us. This fanzine and its predecessor, Chat, have provided us visibility to
others who are interested in this particular kind of small press publication. And, in
return, we've gotten to know quite a few of you pretty well, even if we haven't yet had
the pleasure of actually meeting some of you in person.However, it also wouldn't be wrong to classify
us as convention fans. Before we ever did a single issue of Chat, we had been
regularly attending sf conventions for over two years. We currently average about eight
or nine conventions a year -- pretty small by Tuckerian standards, but still probably
well above the average for sf fandom.Most of the conventions we go to are reasonably
close by, but there are a few that we'll travel a long distance to attend. One of them,
of course, is Midwestcon. It's now about four hours farther away than it used to be
from Tennessee, but it would have to be a lot farther than that before we'd scratch it
from our travel plans each year. Two other conventions that have become habits with us
are about as much a contrast to each other as can possibly be -- Worldcon and Corflu,
the latter being, of course, a fanzine fans' convention.And yet, we attend them for the same reason --
they are two places we're likely to meet other fanzine fans and friends that we rarely
get to see otherwise.It was that very anticipation of getting
together with friends that made us look forward to the long drive to Chicago for
Worldcon this year. We had discussed other means of getting there, like flying, but the
drive didn't look difficult -- just long -- and it turned out we could save several
hundred dollars by providing our own transportation.So drive we did. We left home the day before
the convention, with the intention of stopping over somewhere in Indiana or Ohio that
night, leaving what we expected would be an easy drive to Chicago on the opening day of
Chicon. To get there, we took a southerly route through western Maryland, southern
Pennsylvania, and central Ohio and Indiana. Besides avoiding hundreds of miles of toll
roads, this would also allow us to visit an architectural marvel we'd been wanting to
see for quite some time -- Frank Lloyd Wright's "Fallingwater" house in southwestern
Pennsylvania.We stopped in Cumberland, Maryland for
lunch, and to that point the drive had been pretty routine, but we were amused by all
the science fictional references we had noticed along the way. One of the exits from
Interstate 68 is M.V. Smith Road (no sign of any R.A. Heinlein Avenue though).
Farther along, right where I-68 passes up and over the eastern continental divide, we
passed beneath Green Lantern Road (the day was pretty bright and no evil was in sight).
The radio stations we listened to along the way were playing music as if they
knew we were heading for a science fiction convention -- the send-off we got as
we left home was the Byrds' "Mr. Spaceman," just before we stopped for lunch we heard
"2,000 Light Years from Home" by the Rolling Stones, and as we neared the turnoff for
Fallingwater, there was Donovan and "Sunshine Superman."Perhaps Donovan's other 1960s hit,
"Mellow Yellow," might have been more appropriate at that point, though. The road to
Fallingwater was two lane and narrow, and we were often trapped behind slow moving
vehicles. On the one occasion where it was possible to pass, Dick eased the car out
over the yellow line to have a look-see for oncoming traffic. Immediately there was a
wet-sounding *squelch* from the road as if we were driving through congealing mud.
Ulp! We looked at each other, then, with a feeling of dread, in our car's rear view
mirrors. Sure enough, there was a yellow tire-mark trail on the road. A little farther
on, the road-painting truck was parked in a turn-off, having just restriped the section
of road we had traveled. We never did see any road crew setting out warning pylons; we
suspect that the Pennsylvania state budget is so tight these days it's cheaper and
easier just to let motorists find out for themselves.When we got to Fallingwater, we found
a thick splattering of yellow paint along one side and near the bottom of our nice white
car. Most of it is still there. It won't wash off, but Dick says it will flake off
under his thumbnail, bit by bit. In fact, every time he goes out to drive it, he makes
a point to flake off a little bit more of it. The rate he's going, he should be
finished by, say, "In the Year 2525"...Anyway, Fallingwater was spectacular, and
lived up to our expectations, especially the magnificent view from the southwest atop a
little ridge overlooking the creek that runs past the house. The rest of the way to
Chicago presented no further difficulties, aside from long stretches of interstate
repaving. We got as far as Springfield, Ohio that night, and made it to the convention
the next day about an hour before opening ceremonies. It was time for the Worldcon
First Fan guessing game...We play this little game every time we
go to a Worldcon. The object is to correctly guess who the first fan we recognize will
be. Past 'winners' have included people almost anyone would recognize (Moshe Feder and
Marty Cantor), and people almost anyone wouldn't (George Wells and Ron Zukowski). Last
year in Holland, the first fan we recognized at Confiction was Barry Newton, who lives
only about 20 miles from here. We looked at each other in mock disbelief, then Dick
said, "You mean we came to this convention just to meet you?"This year, the 'winner' was Dan Hoey,
who lives only slightly farther from us than does Barry. The odds of this happening two
years in a row we figured was pretty steep. We didn't seem to find any omen from the
fannish ghods in it, but Dick decided he'd better rush right out and buy an Illinois
lottery ticket, just in case.Actually, we didn't need too much luck
during Chicon in finding people we had looked forward to seeing, but we weren't usually
fortunate enough to be able to enjoy their company for more than relatively short
periods of time. We were always able to connect up with friends for dinner or
sightseeing, but never seemed to hang around with each other afterwards. This was true
even beyond the bounds of the convention itself -- we barely managed more than a hail
and farewell for two old friends from Knoxville we met in the Chicago Institute of Art's
restroom, before we had to move on (this gives a different kind of meaning to the
parting phrase 'gotta go!').
The chaotic nature of Chicon was perhaps
most typified by the nightly room parties. It used to be possible to find people you
knew at Worldcon bid parties, and be able to sit down with them and talk for a while.
It was something you looked forward to doing, in fact. No longer! Bid parties at
Worldcons are now human pinball machines. You carom off people making your way to the
bar for refreshments; your senses are assaulted by a a kaleidoscope of sight and sound.
It's impossible to understand anyone who is more than two feet away from you. The most
extreme example of this was Winnipeg bid party, where people were ushered in one doorway
of their suite to where beverages and snacks were being served; the press of incoming
people then sort of extruded you out the other doorway. If you weren't quick with
your hands, you didn't get anything to eat or drink. We don't know how anyone could be
expected to find out anything about a Worldcon bid there.One quiet innovation in bid parties we
observed during Chicon was the morning parties served up by the Louisville and
Atlanta Worldcon bids. This saved the cost of breakfast for those who could haul
themselves out of bed before the crack of noon. (We had seen this done earlier at a
regional convention, so it wasn't a totally new idea.) Louisville had a low-tech
breakfast of cake and cookies while Atlanta went hi-tech with french toast.
Unfortunately, the hotel wiring wasn't so hi-tech, and all the hot plates going at once
caused their hotel suite's circuit breakers to trip with annoying frequency. Eventually,
they did work it all out, and we hope this will become a new tradition at conventions
everywhere.Apart from the parties, other things we
remember most about Chicon were the baseball game excursion we and about 20 other fans
took to the new Comiskey Park (we even received scoreboard recognition, which probably
left the other 40,000 people at the game wondering what a 'Chicon' was), the
off-the-beaten-path location of the fanzine room (yet again), and our first Hugo Awards
ceremony as nominees.We weren't exactly surprised when we
were notified in May that Mimosa would be appearing on the Chicon Hugo ballot.
The year before, we had tied for seventh in nominating ballots, and two fanzines that
finished higher were not published in 1990. On the other hand, we wouldn't have been
upset if Mimosa hadn't been nominated -- the reason we publish Mimosa has
nothing to do with winning awards. Instead, the experience was mostly pleasant, a point
we tried to bring across in the autobiographical sketch we were asked to write for the
Hugo Ceremony booklet:- - - - - - - - - -
DICK AND NICKI LYNCH, AVERAGE FANS
Even though we edit a general interest
fanzine, we are somewhat unaccustomed to writing about ourselves, so this fannish
autobiographical sketch will be mercifully short. For those who have never met us, Dick
is the taller and the more rabid baseball fan, while Nicki is the comelier and the more
artistically inclined. Although we are originally from New York State, we now live in
the Washington, D.C. metro area, a far cry from southeastern Tennessee where we were
living when we discovered fandom going on two decades ago. There, we were co-founders
(along with a lot of people) of the now-defunct Chattanooga Science Fiction Association.
Since then, we have been, individually or combined, active as convention chairs,
fanzine publishers, amateur press association official editors, artists, and artist
agents. We've also attended lots of conventions, although until the last three years,
most of them have been in the mid-south U.S.A. At one of them, the 1981 DeepSouthCon,
we were honored with the Rebel Award "... for service to Southern Fandom."All in all, though, we consider ourselves
fairly ordinary fans -- we own fewer books than Forry Ackerman, have fewer fanzines than
Bruce Pelz, have attended fewer conventions than Bob Tucker, and have a much
lower annual income than Jerry Pournelle, Inc. It's only our fanzine, Mimosa,
that you Chicon V members have kindly informed us that is above average. And for
that, you have our thanks and appreciation.- - - - - - - - - -
It turned out that we weren't fortunate
enough to win this year, but if nothing else, being seated in the nominees section gave
us a better view of the proceedings. And one of the things we got a good look at was
the actual Hugo Award itself (we were seated right next to Teddy Harvia, who won one).
The rocket was made out of acrylic instead of metal this year, and was attached to a
thin circular marble base by a hex nut that could easily be tightened or loosened by
hand. The Chicon committee had designed the award for easy disassembly for packing and
shipping. This was demonstrated to our amusement when one of the winners unscrewed the
rocket from the base and stuffed it in his pocket. At that point, the fellow's female
companion asked him, "Is that a Hugo in your pocket, or are you just happy to see
me?"We weren't really very happy to
see the convention wind down, even given the reality that it was by no means the
best-run Worldcon we've been to. At times, organizational breakdowns affected many of
the scheduled program events. One example was an unscheduled practice session for the
Masquerade, which disrupted scheduled events for that ballroom the same day. Some
events, most notably the opening and closing ceremonies, looked pitifully
under-rehearsed. A few planned events, like the Worldcon bidders panel, were, by some
oversight, omitted from the pocket program altogether and as a result never happened.
The TAFF/DUFF Auction almost fell into this last category, but word-of-mouth publicity
as well as some last-minute hand-lettered signs posted in the Program events area saved
the day.As we were driving home, we had lots of
time to think back over the previous six days and talk about our individual highlights.
We enjoyed seeing many of our friends again, many of whom contribute to this fanzine.
We also made new acquaintances, like TAFF representative Pam Wells and first fandomite
Mel Korshak. In spite of organizational breakdowns, real and perceived, it's really
the people you meet that can make the difference between a subjectively 'good' and 'bad'
convention. Using that as a yardstick, Chicon was a 'good' convention for us. We're
happy we went, and we're happy we had the chance to see old friends and new, even though
we wish we could have been in a more compact setting.# # #
That 'seeing old friends and new' wish
came true for us a little over a month later, at Ditto 4, hosted by Cathy Doyle and Kip
Williams in Virginia Beach; it was a convention as much unlike a Worldcon as can
possibly be. Whereas Chicon had thousands of people in attendance, this convention had
about thirty. Where Chicon tried to appeal to just about everyone, this convention was
meant exclusively for the fanzine fan. Where Chicon had many different concurrent
tracks of programming, this convention had less than one, and that consisted of sitting
on a veranda looking out onto the Atlantic Ocean.The Atlantic Ocean turned out to be the
featured attraction of the convention. Mid October was well past the tourist season, so
the beach was almost deserted. But the weather that weekend was unseasonably warm, and
much of the convention's activities moved outdoors to the large patio area overlooking
the beach. It was almost surreal, sitting in the warm sunshine talking about fanzine
publishing with Ted White and rich brown, all the while watching big ships slowly sail
out beyond where the ocean meets the sky.The nice weather that weekend also
benefitted other events besides Ditto. Since the season was over, we expected Virginia
Beach to be almost empty. Well, it wasn't -- it was overrun with people getting
married! The hotel we stayed at hosted several weddings each day we were there.
Fortunately, we were on the 'non-wedding' floor and weren't bothered by all the
partying. Saturday night there were three weddings going on. One of them, at the older
part of our hotel across the street from us, was an elaborate affair with a very loud
country music band -- we had no trouble hearing it from almost a quarter of a mile away
as we were walking back to the hotel's main entrance from the meeting rooms. That same
night, another wedding party commandeered the hotel's rooftop restaurant for a private
party. We fans could have probably joined any of the festivities, if we hadn't been
dressed like fans. Somehow, we didn't think 'Jophan Says: Pub Your Ish' t-shirts would
go unnoticed in the bride's re-ception line...There was really no need to get involved
in other people's parties, anyway. Cathy and Kip had gone out of their way to make
sure the convention had enough refreshments to easily last the weekend. And there were
no human pinball parties here! There was plenty of time to talk about fanzines and fan
publishing, something we never seemed to be able to do very much of at Chicon. One
recurring topic was the forthcoming new edition of Harry Warner, Jr.'s fan history of
the 1950s, A Wealth of Fable. Dick had brought dozens of photos of past-era
fans that he was trying to identify for possible use in the new edition. Several
enjoyable hours were spent listening to Ted White, Roger Sims, and Bill Bowers provide
identifications, and then tell stories involving many of the fans pictured in those
photos. It was the stuff that fanzine articles are made from...It seemed almost a shame when Sunday
afternoon rolled around and it was time to leave for home. Ditto had been a nice
counterpoint to Worldcon, and had banished some of the discontentment the chaos of
Chicon had left with us.In spite of all our travels this year,
we're not in any danger of burnout. In fact, Corflu, the other fanzine fans' convention,
is a mere 75 days (and a transcontinental plane ride) away as we write this. The
convention committee is inviting several 1950s-era fanzine fans who live in the area.
It'll be epic.It'll be the stuff that fanzine articles
are made from... All illustrations by Sheryl Birkhead |
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