RELEARNING "CONFERENCE-IQ"
Here we go! It’s been eighteen months since we’ve all gotten together on such a grand scale. And from the current roster, we’re looking at something in the range of seven hundred people attending. There have been several conferences over the past few months where some have dared to attend even as the spike in the Delta variant rained down, but for most of us this is our first real outing.
And having produced a couple of local meetups in NYC and Austin with forty to forty five people in attendance at each, this does not even touch the amount of people about to congregate.
From my own perspective there is definitely an excitement in getting together again and yet there is still some nervousness as well. Though I’m fully vaccinated and received the booster this week, there are still the unknowns and that’s never an ideal feeling.
Yet, PREA has taken all precautions that are necessary to pull together this event and kudos to the entire organization are certainly merited.
Of course, we now have a whole new set of skills to learn in terms of “Conference-IQ” such as:
Do we hug or do we have an abrupt and awkward stop six inches from each other?
Are we still throwing elbows although not in the sharpened way?
Does anybody shake hands anymore?
Is it okay to drop your mask while having a conversation in the corner?
There are so many other questions about how we are all to interact with each other as we move back to some sense of normalcy after such a dark period of uncertainty. I’m looking forward to reengaging again and when we run into one another, please let me know how you’d like to interact. We all have different ways of jumping back in and I want to respect each and every one of your choices.