[Log] a small retrospective on doing gift exchanges in fandoms
So I participated in my first fandom gift exchange in 2023, and it was a horrible experience. That was 80% my fault—like, intellectually, I know it was mostly my own fault. But it was still horrible, and it soured me so much on the whole thing I thought I'd never do another exchange, much less that I'd participate in the same one again.
Well, I did both!
What happened in 2023 is simple; I hate the fic I wrote. Moreover, I disliked the very writing process, too. The result was that it was an extremly poor experience from a writing perspective, and then the recipient didn't acknoledge the gift at all. Like, I put up with all that pain in order to turn in a gift I hoped they'd like, and then I just... got crickets.
No comment. No kudos. And the combination was just too much, and it just made me very bitter about it. Like, if I ever match with that person again, I'm just defaulting from the get-go, because I'm not doing that again.
And again, intellectually, I know it's mostly my own fault! I should have defaulted! I shouldn't have continued when I hated what I was doing! But I did, and then I got nothing for it, and I just... Yeah. I just don't have any good memories of my first gift exchange, and that sucks.
And to be fair to the recipient, I know my feelings about them are irrational. I've had fics I've written since go completely unacknowledged by the recipient, and it hasn't bothered me nearly as much. (I mean, it still bothers me some. But that's just the nature of the beast, I think.) And I have gotten gifts that I still haven't even read yet months after receiving them; I understand that things happen and stuff slide through the cracks and it's not your fault you sometimes just haven't gotten around to reading something yet. I know all that. I know all that. I do.
I'm still bitter about it.
In 2024, I started doing exchanges regularly. I signed up to Candy Hearts Exchange, and it just continued from there. And it's been a fun time! I've written a lot of stuff in fandoms I never would have otherwise, I've gotten awesome gifts, I've been introduced to a lot of new fandoms I love.
I'm enjoying it! I want to keep doing exchanges!
I don't think I really have a point with this point beyond a desire to just gush about how cool gift exchanges in fandom can be. I've been branching out a lot in my fandom experiences in recent years; I've never been very social or participant in the social-esque avenues of fandom. But in the last few years I've done exchanges, I've done fests and I've even done a big bang.
It's a really different kind of interaction than I used to do. For years and years, I just wrote and read fics, and I never interacted with anybody. I had a Tumblr but didn't really get how it worked and I certainly made no connections there, I completely missed that there were forums on Wattpad until they were gone, and even now I've never even opened the forum page on fanfiction.net... Not that I use FF.net, anymore, but still.
It's just wildly different. It's a lot more personal, with a different kind of joy in it, and less... consumerist, I guess? I don't necessarily mean that in a negative connotation, because there's nothing wrong in just reading and/or writing fics or doing fanart or whatever. Your joy is where your joy is, and how you engage with fandom and whether you choose forge connections in that sphere doesn't invalidate your joy.
Personally, I just didn't use to feel a connection in fandom at all, and changing that has been a slow, deliberate thing, because talking to people, being social, isn't in my skill-set. And I'm just really proud of myself for making the choice to put in effort; because it's really scary.
And that's not say I'm very social in fandom now. I certainly am not. The amount of posts I read on Dreamwidth and don't interact with at all is a lot. But I have made strides and I do... kind of maybe feel a slip of a connection, now? Maybe?