Con 08 Burbank Dessert Party
Review by KTL
fsktl@uaf.edu
Every year Creation puts on a dessert party in a ballroom for gold ticket holders. I think this is relatively new-it’s been on for a while now but it wasn’t always part of the con. Or perhaps like the breakfast, you used to have to pay to go, (and I just never did) but now it’s part of the gold package (so now of COURSE I always go). This year it was VERY late because it had to be scheduled after Lucy’s concert.
Some stars always come to the desert party. Aw shoot-who was there? (I didn’t stay all that long-was meeting cheap seat friends in the bar.) Probably Adrienne-she comes to most things. Either Ted came or I’m mixing up the dessert party and the breakfast (or he came to both.) Daniel Sing (Ming T’ien) came. David Taylor (Solon) came. Katherine Fugate came. Tsianina MAY have been there-I think she was. Steve Sears always comes.
We stuff our faces with pastries, little cakes, ice cream sundaes, and then the stars are introduced and come around to the tables. They not only come to visit, but Creation also has a contest going on for "Best Xena Centerpiece" and I believe the stars or at least some of them are the judges of these. There’s been some really fine centerpieces done over the years—real extensive ones featuring Xena dollies and little hot tubs and stables and horses and all kinds of stuff. After the winner is announced, the music is cued up and people start to dance.
Now-one of the everyday burdens on my gay friends that I deep in my heart fiercely hate, is that they often have to think about where they are and who’s around when they’re out in public and they want to be a couple and give each other all the affection and physical closeness that other couples get to enjoy without thinking about it. Without worrying that there’s some nut out there who might attack them for loving each other and having the audacity to show it.
So conversely, one thing I absolutely love about being at the con in general is that it is a place where same sex spouses/partners/hot dates/whatevers have the chance to act just like any other dating/in love couple. They can hold hands, they can hold each other in their arms, they can snuggle and giggle together without having to worry if it’s safe to do so. It’s an ambience I enjoy tremendously.
The show preached tolerance-at the con, we live it in real life.
For the above reason, I very specifically love the dessert party. Not for the ice cream, (well, not TOTALLY for the ice cream) and not for the visits with the stars. What I love the most is that everyone is free to dance and the only thing that makes someone uncomfortable and decide they won’t get out there is if they can’t dance. It’s not that they shouldn’t dance with their honey-it’s just that they’re embarrassed by their moves-or lack of same.
Happily, it doesn’t keep everybody who can’t dance from getting up. Good dancers or not, many, many people step up and dance at these things. You see partners dancing, you see fan buds dancing, you see Steve Sears dancing with anybody and their sister, you see whole groups of people dancing together. And laughing their heads off.
One of my favorite "more than two people" dancers is a trio that I have seen come to the cons for a number of years now. This trio is composed of two female partners. And the dad of one of them. I see them just about every year at the big California con. They always come to the dessert party. And all three of them always dance together, all three of them holding onto each other at the same time.
You know at Lucy’s concert, there was that question Lucy asked Renee (AKA "Dear Gabby"), "If you’re very shy and you want to tell somebody how much you love them, what do you do?"
And Renee answered, "When they call you up and ask you to sing a duet (pause). . . you say yes."
Then Renee left the stage and Lucy said something like you could also tell someone you love them through music. And she sang another song, a love song to us. Appropriately enough, it was "I Want To Sing You A Love Song."
And when she sang that to us that night at the concert, I suddenly thought about this trio, this father and his child and her partner. And thought to myself in that moment, "He sings his daughter a love song every time he comes to the con with her. And especially, every time he gets up and dances with her and her lover at the dessert party."
I love seeing Lucy at the cons, I love seeing my friends at the con. But there’s other things I also love about the con. And one of these things is the love that you see there. Sometimes this love is way obvious, shouting out loud, like when friends first meet up again for the first time since last year’s con. Or when a favorite star appears on stage. And sometimes this love is something very simple and quiet. Like seeing two very elderly people who have loved each other for decades, making their way slowly over to the convention hall and seeing them be stopped for a hug and/or a hello, time and time again by friends they’ve made over the years of going to Xena cons. Or enjoying watching a table setting up their centerpiece and seeing that they know they’ve got a real good one. Sometimes the love just wraps all around us-and can keep you warm in memory for a long time after you’ve left California-even if you’re going back to Alaska in January. I truly believe this "love is in the air" experience at Xena cons is one of the things that keep people coming back, year after year after year.
KT
