[The following editorial appears in Hidden Years #10, New Blood #13, and Blood of Ten Chiefs #4. --MK]
Wendy and I noticed two things on the Fantasy With Teeth Tour that wound its merry way throughout 1993. One was that there were gratifyingly long lines of fans waiting for us nearly everywhere we went. The other was that many of those same fans, who must've been waiting weeks or months for the day of our appearance and then a couple of hours in the line itself, got up to the table where we were sitting, said "Hi," gave us their books, and vanished in a puff of smoke. Often, we felt the need to let people know that, indeed, we could sign our names and talk at the same time, that we didn't bite, and that we welcomed questions. About anything! At one stop in the Seattle area, we met a young lady with whom I'd been corresponding (about Elfquest in general and finding one's way around the Internet in specific) via e-mail for some months. "Aha," I thought, "at least this one will chat a bit." But she too went past the table quickly enough to produce a redshift. Could it be? No, I'd showered already that week...
So later when I had the chance, I asked her online about this seeming epidemic of "signing shy-itis." The reply was illuminating:
Date: 03-Nov-93 21:08 EST
From: Anna Korra'ti >INTERNET:annako@microsoft.com
Reply to: Re: Test e-maiI, no doubt one of many. :)
I guess I really did zip through that line, didn't I? There were multiple things motivating me, I
guess...
1) Lots and LOTS and LOTS of people there. I had the suspicion that there would be, since you and Mrs. Pini were slated for only three hours, and I know of at least two fanclub Holts in this neck of the woods, so I was expecting that every Elfquest fan for miles around would show up. And I tend to clam up in large crowds - whether in person or online; even on the Two Moons MUSH, I tend to interact regularly with only two or three people at a time.
2) Not wanting to occupy more of your time than necessary, partly because of that humongous crowd, and partly again because I knew that you had a limited schedule.
3) Shyness attack. :) I wasn't sure what to say besides "Hi, I'm your Seattle e-mail correspondent!" I suppose I could have gone on with "I really love Elfquest, and I think Strongbow is the most beautiful thing to ever grace the pages of a comic book," but I think you knew that about me already. :) Though perhaps I should have said that to Mrs. Pini, since she draws my favorite taciturn archer. :)
If it helps to have a fan's perspective about the way people zip through your signing lines, I think the ogre you speculate about (the "These Are Famous People And We Don't Dare Disturb Them For Fear Of Reprisal" ogre - RP) might indeed be lurking about your signings - but I think it's more in the guise of fear of what reactions might be drawn from other fans if one is perceived to occupy too much of your attention, the "Who does she think *SHE* is, standing there babbling when we've all got books to sign, too?!?" ogre. Or, even a more polite version of the same ogre, "Eek, look at all these people, it's only polite to take as little time as possible here. "
Something like this latter ogre was going through my head, after Dar and Vicka and I saw that poor girl behind us in line - the one from Port Angeles, who had brought all of her books *and* all of her friends' books with her. Port Angeles is this teeny little town out on the peninsula - you drive through it on the way to Ruby Beach, from Seattle. It takes a good chunk of time to get there. I figured that since I was standing there with my sole copy of the Hidden Years hardback, and since I could get home with a ten-minute bus ride, it was probably best that I scoot as fast as possible, for this girl's sake.
Something else which has occurred to me is simply that I have an edge most EQ fans cannot necessarily be presumed to have - net access. I can whip off an e-mail to you any time I like, if I have a question or even just want to say hello. And I have been truly pleased that I've been able to do this! But unless a fan is a college student who is studying the computer sciences, or has enough extra cash to pay for something like CompuServe or a public-access Internet account (I have one of these in addition to my work account), or is employed somewhere that is connected to the Internet, he or she won't have this same kind of direct access to you. So I guess this is another reason I didn't want to linger overlong at your table; I'm already spamming your e-mail box, so I'd have felt weird hogging your attention in a public setting like a signing.
Hmm. OK. There's a certain logic embedded in there, I guess. But just for the record, and for
all future appearances (what, did you think that just because we've burnt to a crisp after a year of
touring that we'll never do such a thing again? Our accountant, who likes taking the travel expense
deductions, would kill us!), we greatly enjoy taking the time to chat with the folks who've gone out of
their way to let us know they like what we're doing, or to let us know of a concern they have, or just to
shoot the breeze about this or that. No matter how the store personnel have arranged traffic control
(and for the most part they do a bang-up job of it), we also take note of how things are going, how long
the line is, how much time we have and so on, and do our bit to manage
the line so that no one feels that they haven't gotten all they came for -
and a bit more. Unless we've got a plane to catch or some such
constraint, we'll stay past the scheduled time as long as it takes to
make everyone happy - or at least satisfied. Hey, folks, get tribal - we
do these things for you!
Richard A Pini