Painful Delay

For those following my gigs, the Professor Java’s gig has now been moved to Dec 5th.  Still no date or time for the reception/signing, hopefully I will have that info sometime this coming week. It will run through Jan 31st.

Why?  The former art manager there apparently double-booked November. Ie-circumstances beyond my control.

Now for my little rant.  Beyond my control, but am I pissed?  Hurt?  Hell, yes.

I know it’s not MY fault, but to me it’s still embarrassing.  All the Cons I’ve done this summer, I’ve talked up this show.  I’ve held back some of my best work, stuff that might well have sold, for this show.  I dropped money I don’t really have to order more books, and hanging wire, etc.  I’ve devoted a buttload of energy to getting things looking pretty, hang-worthy, printing out tags for each piece and setting prices and trying to do everything the “right’ way (which may not seem like much, but when you’ve never ever done a show like this before, and are paranoid and anal about details…the mental energy involved is numbing).  Hell, I’ve even sort of planned my winter around those dates.  I passed over a lot of potential gigs in November (ie- Infinity Con) because I was never sure exactly when the reception might be.

The kicker is, much like the nightmare I endured with Midas, that no one informed me.  Not an email, not a phone call, nothing.  I called them to see what time the stuff needed to be up by on Sunday, and what time someone would be there to let me in.  Good thing, because imagine if I’d just shown up Sunday at like 7 am, work in hand.  Doubly mortifying.  The new art manager said they couldn’t find the old art manager’s records.  That may be true, but after talking to me, and saying “How does December work for you?” and my response of “But I signed paperwork!  She put her copy in a binder!”, they found her records within 15 minutes.  And the emails aren’t to a specific person, they are to “art@”, so I assume they are available to most anyone involved.  I still have MY emails regarding the show.  Did theirs all get deleted?

So yes, I do see possible reasonings for not being contacted, and for me slipping through the cracks, although there are a lot of ifs involved.  But it doesn’t change the fact that I’m really devastated right now, and a little bitter, and very, very gunshy.  Yeah, maybe it will happen Dec. 5th, and I sure hope so, but experience tells me not to get my hopes up and don’t hold my breath.  It won’t be real until that morning.