I Heart My Friends

Today’s post will be a short one. I think I’ve still got jet lag. Which is weird, because I haven’t flown anywhere.

These past four days, I’ve been attending the Malice Domestic convention in Bethesda, MD, and the Festival of Mystery (FOM) in Oakmont, PA., and it’s been all about friends. Making new ones, seeing old ones, meeting ones I’ve only known online. (Facebook, Twitter, blogging, and other forms of connecting via cyberspace are terrific ways to make and maintain friendships all over the world, but sometimes there’s no substitute for that face-to-face contact.)

Luckily, I didn’t have any trouble recognizing my cyberpals. Most of them looked like their profile pictures. Some even looked better than their pictures (I’d like to thank everyone for not pointing out that my profile pic has far less gray hair than my actual self). Not surprisingly, everyone seemed to “behave” like I’d expect, too (a good thing, of course).

I got a chance to hang with members of my wonderful MI family (some of whom I met for the first time): Terri Bischoff, Jessie Chandler, Vicki Doudera, Kathleen Ernst (and her sister, Barbara), Beth Groundwater, Jess Lourey, Alice Loweecey, Gin Malliet, new Inker Maggie Sefton, Deb Sharp, Joanna Slan, and Lois Winston.

I spent time with people I’d met at other events and through Facebook and Twitter, members of my local MWA and SinC chapters (I was even made an honorary Guppie), writing idols, peeps from my Bouchercon bowling team, fellow Agatha nominees, the wonderful Malice volunteers and FOM organizers (Hi Richard and Mary Alice), booksellers, and, of course, many, many, many mystery fans. Which was the coolest thing of all. (Meeting Sue Grafton was pretty cool, too!)

 

Alan