I could feel their discomfort as I tried to secure a seat, though it was uncomfortable for me, too, to have come searching for community and instead be seen as an interloper. In the gaming room, I found myself surrounded entirely by men. But even on this small scale, the activities were deeply segregated. I had attended a small convention when I was fourteen, a laidback production at a local polytechnic university where five classrooms had been converted to showcase manga and cosplay accessories. The truth was that I was going to Comic Con.Īt the time, my experience with conventions was limited. A few nights after a former employee broke in and robbed the place, I called in to work and said I had a family emergency. I felt rootless, desperate not for religion, but for something adjacent to it-a congregation, a fervent, communal cause. I knew how to deescalate when they pulled knives or threatened to have me fired for insufficient whipped cream. I knew about their marriages and the make and models of their first cars. Serving coffee turned out to be less about coffee and more about managing customers’ emotional needs. In hindsight, I can see that I was depressed, but a public-facing job always complicates this.
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