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With Franklin and Winter Quarters squarely in the rear view mirror I’ve had a few days to sort things out, clean up and prep for a living history in Maryland next weekend. During all of this I’ve been able to see everyone’s great comments about the programs myself and the IR have hosted this last year and been very humbled. But one statement keeps coming up that somewhat irks me: “Can’t make it this year, looking forward to next year”. While I appreciate the enthusiastic outpouring nothing could really be further from the truth. Valley of Death was awesome, but I don’t know when I’ll do another program there. “Winter Quarters 1862” was so detailed I’m still sort of unpacking it mentally, but it will be until 2021 before I do a program there with a cap over 50. “Warlike Along the Rapidan” just closed registration and there were guys making their decision last night to go. Why? We come up with fresh event ideas to keep the hobby fresh, always moving. Part of what made the mainstream world and my own group’s event schedule suck so bad was that it was the same event every single year, like clockwork and it got old. I’m not going to spend my time away from my kid circling the same events over and over.
If you look at the people organizing events right now we’re all in a pretty good part of life right. We’re all married and the majority of us either have young kids or are talking about starting a family relatively soon. What does that mean for event participants? Simple- it means that these opportunities to participate in one shot heavily detailed programs are fleeting by the month and every one you miss is an opportunity that will likely never happen again. These events take so much time to iron out details that eventually going to a dance recital is going to outweigh cutting out paycall for me. Throwing a baseball with his boy is going to outweigh reading Hardee’s and text arguing with me how to properly address a division within a regiment during drill for Mike Clarke. Fixing his kid’s wagon will be more important than hauling an Army wagon for Craig. The scenarios with this are endless, but it’s a reality. I watched it happen with events I attended starting back in 2001 and I’m watching the same mistakes now. Don’t sell yourself short because you feel you don’t have a piece of kit to make an event. Email, message or call one of the organizers. Get your fees paid and get to reading! And lastly, stop waiting until the last minute to register.
If you look at the people organizing events right now we’re all in a pretty good part of life right. We’re all married and the majority of us either have young kids or are talking about starting a family relatively soon. What does that mean for event participants? Simple- it means that these opportunities to participate in one shot heavily detailed programs are fleeting by the month and every one you miss is an opportunity that will likely never happen again. These events take so much time to iron out details that eventually going to a dance recital is going to outweigh cutting out paycall for me. Throwing a baseball with his boy is going to outweigh reading Hardee’s and text arguing with me how to properly address a division within a regiment during drill for Mike Clarke. Fixing his kid’s wagon will be more important than hauling an Army wagon for Craig. The scenarios with this are endless, but it’s a reality. I watched it happen with events I attended starting back in 2001 and I’m watching the same mistakes now. Don’t sell yourself short because you feel you don’t have a piece of kit to make an event. Email, message or call one of the organizers. Get your fees paid and get to reading! And lastly, stop waiting until the last minute to register.
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