Sustaining involvement and joy in tiny fandoms

[vriddy]

Content notes: There are a few moments of self-pity in here :D I don't like being negative in general, but I thought I'd be honest about things, both for myself and for my future self who will totally be over it, yet able to remember what it was like not to be that cool, thanks to this post XD

I've written quite a few fics in tiny fandom-of-ones before, sometimes even for manga that didn't have a translation available anywhere so really no hope of finding fellow fans :D And I enjoy it, like, finishing a book, seeing there's no fics for your particular vision (or at all!), scribbling and dropping one, and then huuuh sometimes nothing because it was just about two background characters that deeply intrigued me and apparently only me. Or sometimes, maybe once a year, getting a comment like "I just finished reading the book and I'm so glad someone shared the same vision!" -- that feels sooo good :D Like having left a little treasure out there for someone else to find. (It's what I imagine geocaching is like??) And it's happened to me in the reverse so many times, too! Bless you yuletide folks in particular, for unknowingly having had my back so often!

Writing in a tiny fandom, and staying there

However, what was happening then is that I was occasionally writing a fic for a tiny fandom and then going back to my other chonky active fandoms after. Sustaining involvement in a tiny fandom because I've become 10000% super duper fannish about it has been... an experience, and a ton of self-learning (some not so pleasant!!). I always wondered how folks managed to write 100k fics for tiny pairs and/or tiny fandoms, and I guess I will keep wondering because it doesn't look like I have what it takes. For most fics, I need at least one other clown out there to be excited about it with me.

At one point, I even managed to get myself depressed because writing a lot for a rareship/tiny fandom means that if anyone who's not me stumbles in there in the future, they will have a decent amount of choice. So there won't be the "I'm so glad I found ANYTHING for this fandom!" effect like discovering the single fic for that old movie, and bonding a little bit over that. So any story that didn't get any comments likely never will, and I'll never know what actually resonated with someone else, if anything. Then last month, I had this happen to me from the other side: the anime for a light novel just came out and one person had carried the tag pretty much on their own for years, thus I could afford to be picky about what to read! (I did comment on the ones I did :D) Nothing like experiencing a bit of hypocrisy to get over something, haha. Also it's pretty funny to notice how a fandom with 60+ fics feels like an absolute cornucopia to me nowadays, despite spending years in megafandom-land. BNHA had 300k+ fics!

As time passes, this made me realise I apparently write fanfic for 3 reasons:

1. Because I must write what's in my mind/heart (feels the most fannish to me!!)
2. Because I want to learn or try out something new craft-wise for my writing
3. To share silly headcanons

When I'm feeling #1, it's when I feel at my most fannish and it's a delight. I would write it no matter what. The executioner's rescue was like this, even though the Spring Thunder fandom is still an uncategorised tag on AO3 and there aren't really any readers out there (clearly!). The fic has multiple tropes I love (characters thinking they're on their own but actually, they're not!! Several of them, too! Hurt/comfort, humour, standing/fighting by each other's side, happy endings for characters who have it rough, etc, etc, nomnomnom...). May someone else enjoy it someday :D But the fic would have happened anyway.

I guess maybe at the moment, I've run out of these more serious headcanons and explorations for K-9 🤔 At least the ones under 10k words. I've got complex daydreams about what Shigure has going on and could be plotting in the background and why, but at the moment it doesn't seem worth it to sit down and explore all that, giving the space these ideas deserve. (It prooobably doesn't help that I'm editing 2 original novels at the moment, so it could just be my mental space for long projects is full!) (but I don't think it's just that...) And for a bit, I was anxious about sharing my Leopard/Tree fic before canon josses it, but actually no one cares about these two, so there is no rush. I'm kinda moving it from category 1 to category 2 because the latest version is at a good length to experiment with craft things without overwhelm. At the moment, it's two timelines told through a dream to show what they escaped and how, in a way, they ended up right back where they started, but I think there could be better ways to show that circular aspect through structure. Even if canon josses me, it doesn't matter, I know their truth 😎 Haha. Thanks to this fic, I already experimented with rewriting to get rid of flatness so it's been good.

For the #3 type of stories, I'm kind of losing steam for them, and I regret it. Drabble length is still fine, but otherwise it's things like: it's established that Fujimaru and Kagari live together... Fujimaru has a dog, Shieru... Kagari must be walking it occasionally? But it's also established that Kagari gets lost easily, so maybe it's more like Shieru walking Kagari XD I wrote half a fic in January and outlined the rest of the incidents shenanigans perfectly fine walk, as far as Kagari is concerned :D but for something that's just as funny to share in one sentence, has huh no literary value (fun is a value though!!!!!), and is unlikely to resonate with anyone who'll tell me, it's hard to encourage myself to finish it, and the other fics like it. I hope I will, though. Even if only for myself. With some luck, having accidentally put in a bit of distance will help.

Write for yourself

Of course, of course, "write for yourself first" and I do! But at some point, when you really internalise it, the question of "why share at all?" kinda comes up. You have to do the formatting, and then try (and fail, for me!) to keep your hopes in check that maybe this one, this one will resonate with someone... I mentioned before, I usually post fic/share stories in order to connect. I tried to pretend I have an archivist mindset, doesn't matter if anyone reads it, but I can't quiiiite pull it off. Even for the fandoms or ships that truly have no audience for whatever reason, I still imagine someone in the future finding it and being happy to find something, anything at all. But that usually sustains me only for the once-offs. I've seen tiny fandom writers in my circles who just stopped sharing what they wrote, and I didn't really get it, but now I kind of do a little. There is a "What for?" that gets louder with every new story.

The scam comments on AO3 haven't helped!! The scammers found K-9 too, so for a month or two, most of the comments I received, as few as they may be, were fake... I had my little breakdown about that, too XD I was going to stop email notifications altogether but in the end, filtering comments so they go to a separate folder rather than my inbox has helped a lot. Before, in the inbox I'd go "omg omg omg what fic is it for aaaah" then get crushingly disappointed. Now I check this separate folder with a "checking the spam folder" mindset, and it's a lovely surprise when it happens to be a real one :D That shortcircuited the initial excitement which was all I needed to avoid the high-and-crash. I also haven't been posting much lately so that's helped too (deep in soul thief structural edits!!). I find it interesting that the scammers seem to hit each fic only once, even though the message and scam format looks different each time. I know it's probably just different bots crawling through the many many AO3 links in their own way, but I like to imagine hard-boiled scammers negotiating for which tags they get to pollute in a cigar smoke-filled backroom somewhere XD

On having, or not having, folks to chat about canon with

I think for K-9 I've been in a weird spot in that although I created a handful of beloved fellow fans (mwahahaahahaha *thunder in the background* 🌩🌩) they all got kneecapped by life around the same time, so forget about fic or headcanons, things suddenly went from talking about canon with multiple people multiple times a week, down to exchanging a couple of sentences once a week after a new chapter with one person (YOU ROCK :D ♡). It's been unexpectedly hard, and at first I tried to share reactions and joy for later, but weeks went by, over a month, and it felt like I was just overwhelming people more, and one also admitted to having marked everything as read. At some point, the Nerd Defence Mechanism in my mind activated: "Self! Self! Alert! You appear to be talking with great excitement about something no one else cares about! Abort! Abort! 'Cool story, bro. Anyway' is surely incoming!" and I started just shutting down about canon, too... Which got way harder as weeks and new chapters came and went because this canon truly embraces the rule of cool... This week in K-9 was particularly hard-hitting because a character with a muzzle showed up again, and the urge to drop into one of these people's DMs while sharing screenshots and making horse noises, knowing that just a few weeks ago that person who looooves muzzled up characters would have jumped up and down and made whale noises in reply just left me suuuuper depressed instead of excited after reading, because I kept wanting to reach out and having to stop myself. Just like I did the week before (canon lesbians), and before that (canon tongue piercings), and before that (MOTORBIKES). It felt like I was truly losing the joy even for canon...

I'm back now, though!!! >:D As of huh yesterday evening *knocks wood with fingers toes and face* I feel more like myself. Mentioning this all because I think losing the ability to even talk about canon probably doesn't help either with sustaining involvement in tiny fandoms? You need to have something!! But that's assuming you even found other people to chat about canon in the first place, too, I guess...

Coping mechanisms

Which brings us to, coping mechanisms! Haha. ...You know, I spent actual time searching for how people do it, heh, when it started becoming harder. Here's what I found people do:

1. Keep writing, stop posting
2. Rope more people into the fandom
3. Get into a bigger fandom in parallel -- the bigger the better!
4. Mindset change: posting to connect vs posting to archive / connect quietly
5. Wait to post so there is less attachment to the story
6. RP being someone who doesn't care like you wish you were

I think I've basically done all of these 🤔 I'm on #1 at the moment, but secretly hoping it's just an extended version of #5. #5 was an absolute necessity after the December and January fever... Posting when still in a feverish state makes the come-down even harder. I did a bit of #3 with Wind Breaker and that helped. I think in the past, when the big fandom was my main one, that meant occasionally readers who were interested in my writing also took a chance on my fic for smaller fandoms or smaller pairs (don't think anyone would have read the Hawks/Machia fic otherwise XD). But it's something I can't really force, and I'm not cooking up anything for non-tiny fandoms at the moment. I feel like doing #6 until it becomes true (but in a healthy way) is probably something to continue striving for. #4 doesn't jive with my brain unfortunately. Like I mentioned above, the best I can do is connecting quietly through space and time in my imagination :D But that's not as effective when actually staying in the tiny fandom, at least not for me.

So I think my techniques will continue to be #5 and working on some version of #6 haha.

This got so long again XD XD I'm adding headers! But also, now, with the important question!!

Beloved tiny fandom and fandom-of-one writers and creators out there, how do you do it? And how do you keep it up? How do you manage the psychology of it? Do you have down moments regardless of the joy of it, and how do you handle those?? Clearly I do suck at it, so I'm all ears! It'd be cool to reduce the amount of non-joy as I go back to my gigantic file of K-9 ideas and throw them into the cauldron, eventually... :D Any coping mechanism to add to the list? And I think this all probably applies to podficcers and icon makers too, who tend to navigate smaller circles. How do you sustain it?? Please allow me to learn your secrets :D

Comments

[sonofgodzilla]

This post has s a lifeline to me. So much of this is what I have been feeling. I cannot thank you enough for putting that feeling about trying to manage whilst being in a small fandom into such eloquent words.

[vriddy]

You are one of the people whose wisdom I was hoping to hear and benefit from ♡ It's not exactly a happy place, but I'm sincerely glad this post could be beneficial in other ways, too. Occasionally, hearing "You're not alone" really does help! Thank you, and good luck. To us all out there!!

[nnozomi]

Sustaining involvement in a tiny fandom because I've become 10000% super duper fannish about it has been... an experience, and a ton of self-learning (some not so pleasant!!). I always wondered how folks managed to write 100k fics for tiny pairs and/or tiny fandoms, and I guess I will keep wondering because it doesn't look like I have what it takes.
I know how you feel about a lot of this! I've been writing a very long thing for a fandom of literally three people*, and have managed to keep doing it because a) the other two have been kind about reading it as I go along, with comments, and b) I can't not write it right now, regardless. Also telling myself that at some point I may rework the whole thing as an original work (EVEN FEWER people to read it, really, but still a writing challenge and more of a solitary endeavor in nature anyway). (*Fandom of 3 in English; the Chinese fandom is very large but I'm too scared to get involved in that as anything but an entirely passive consumer). I think it has felt easier for me because the writing, while really important to me, is only one part of my interaction with the canon as a whole (along with watching and writing up notes on what I watch, listening to music, etc. etc.) as well?
sorry, incoherent and not helpful. I am knee-jerk (hypocritically) inclined to say, post what you've written even if nobody comments! just because you never know. I got into one of my dearest fandoms by reading fic entirely fandom-blind...

[vriddy]

Fandom of three sounds delightful :D I had that for a few weeks at the very beginning with K-9, and it was such a self-sustaining, virtuous circle of amazingness. I mean it's the usual fandom joy: those periods in which you have a handful of people on your own wavelength and you cheer and encourage and inspire each other. (I was looking for when I mentioned it happening in my previous fandom, but looks like I briefly described it for K-9 itself back in December!). A few is plenty, yeah, having both the fanworks and canon enjoyment with others sounds really nice. Unfortunately I suspect I overwhelmed people with how much I was sharing, haha. Whoops. Rarely doing things halfway I guess.

I am knee-jerk (hypocritically) inclined to say, post what you've written even if nobody comments! just because you never know.

I get what you mean and I'm usually inclined to agree, and I can do it one time, seven times, but at some point it just gets really hard. I don't know how to not sound melodramatic about it, haha. It just is. Posting just becomes this pointless activity you're lying to yourself about that dredges up this big ball of ill feelings... And then feeds into its own negativity because not only do I not enjoy feeling moody like that, but I wish I could just grow past it already, too.

I also forgot to mention it in the post because, well, the problem is that I forgot about it altogether, but recently I was rereading old Dreamwidth posts and came across an old K-9 fic post. In canon, their office is 5 basement levels down and I used to joke I wanted the fandom to grow thousands of "basement fic" where they all just move in there together, just like Avengers had "Tower fic" for a while back in the day... After seeing my post again I was kind of horrified to realise that even though I had dozens of ideas for basement fic at the time, the fact that my attempt didn't seem to resonate with anyone apparently killed my daydreams about the whole concept and I stopped thinking about it at all. Which was quite shocking to me!! Like, discouraged from posting or writing is one thing, but destroying the daydreams altogether is a new one. It's probably when I moved from #5 distance to #1 stop for a while. Like, this just isn't a healthy way to wander about fandom.

But well, it doesn't mean I've just been moping either, instead I've been focusing on orig projects for the last month, especially since I can't help but think "well, 5 whole people have volunteered to beta-read the witch, and that's more readers than my fic will get!!" (including you!! Which, thank you - of course circumstances and availability might change, but for now this is also carrying me :D <3).

Wishing you the best of luck with your long project!! And happy, delightful tiny community feelings in your fandom-of-three :D I appreciate you sharing your thoughts and kind words about this. I suspect it's something many of us eventually have to grapple with, in some form or other.

(Also curious about which fandom you got into through reading fic canon-blind :D 👀)

[hoarmurath]

I mean...it's Day 100+ of my Wanted Detective hyperfixation. I have managed it somewhat by simply gushing about the bits I can gush about to partner and friends without spoiling the story. I do also have incredible friends who listen to me gush even though they haven't consumed it.

Also a friend started watching the show last night and to have my headcanons validated even based on just one episode feels like cocaine... XD

Otherwise...I will be honest, writing most of that 160k I have written for the pairing honestly feels like being possessed, they're just not letting me go. I need to write it out because otherwise it will keep being stuck in my head. Maybe it will stop at some point, but I do not know when.

But I do get it...;_;

*hugs*

Also I mean...I do want to edit and post all that I have written, but also it has been an incredible journey in LETTING myself write all that sincere, bonkers and often quite filthy prose. So in a way it's already been worth it for me, but I can understand that might not carry a person very far.

This is a very messy comment (I am big anxiety/energy about my upcoming surgery on Monday haha), but I do hope it helps at least a little. ;_; I do appreciate that you post and share, you make my brain have crunchy thoughts about writing! And I think seeing you use Scrivener made me feel a bit more at ease about picking it up again in January when Ellipsus crapped out on me on a 24k file. For a fic that turned out to be 106k... :D

[vriddy]

I do also have incredible friends who listen to me gush even though they haven't consumed it.

That is very cool, you are surrounded by cool people :D I have some friends who are probably sincerely happy to listen like that, but getting excited one-sidedly quickly makes me self-conscious haha, damn you brain XD And yessss on another one of your friends starting to watch the show, may they get lots into it, too :D

it has been an incredible journey in LETTING myself write all that sincere, bonkers and often quite filthy prose

Trying to see what the situation enables, directly or not, sounds like a great way to go about it :D I'll crunch on the thoughts, too! Wishing you the most wonderful journey following the insanity in the delightful places where it's taking you, haha.

And yeah Scrivener is MADE for big projects :D I used to organise things a chapter/file when using an online editor (4tw though, not Ellipsus) but Scrivener has been utterly invaluable for editing.

I'm replying a bit late, so belated good luck for today, I hope the surgery went/goes well, and wishing you the best with recovery!

[marysue_thesparkle]

I'm fairly new & haven't gotten into TINY tiny fandoms yet (unless you count Runaway to the Stars, who has 7 fics on AO3, but I'm not super fannish about it yet). But this seems like a good question to ask myself for when I will.

I'm sorry you're struggling with it *hugs*, I think I'd personally try to drag my friends into it. Or do crossovers here and there, which got me into new fandoms so.

[vriddy]

7 fics does sound tiny, though maybe truly tiny is when half or more of the fics are your own? XD

Thank you for the kind words! I dragged a couple of friends into it at the beginning of the journey (strategy #2 XD), but once availability changes/life hits, it can get hard. The crossover thought is very intriguing though, especially because I've made comparisons with BNHA (my previous fandom) a lot when roping people into my main tiny fandom. Hmmmm.......!!

[sisterdivinium]

(This will be long. As usual. SORRY! ^^;)
You know, sometimes I think we're a bit hard on ourselves when we realise we're not having the fun we wanted. No one is owed comments or interaction, sure, but I think nobody will deny the fact that most of us enjoy them because, at the end of the day, a whole lot of us do still view fandom as an act that tends towards community-building. The older people who started out with zines will tell you that no one really got a reaction back in the day and you were lucky enough to get yourself printed, while others will say that fandom today has simply and irrevocably morphed into this contemporary "consumer content" shitshow and I hear them... But if you've lived through a good moment in a fandom you're always going to think back to that and want it. It's human to identify something positive about a given experience and want to relive it in some way -- we're not all cut out to be ascetics and there's always going to be a divide between rationally understanding how wanting can be damaging and actually commanding emotion so as to stop wanting. So. Being generally aware is one hell of a step forward, I think. All this to comment on that initial note of yours and say that we can sound a little negative sometimes, as a treat, LOL.

I'd say that, out of the reasons you've given for your own writing, #1 is the ideal one for sitting down and writing fic, yeah. When we can confidently say "the fic would have happened anyway", regardless of the potential audience, that's when you know you're really "writing for yourself". I'd say that's what moves us most when we're in teeny tiny fandomland -- it always helps to have someone with us (also because those conversations can spark MOAR ideas, which leads to MOAR fic) but if the idea is as strong as that then it hardly matters if someone else will read it or not. It's got to get out and it shall!

As for silly headcanons... I suppose there's a reason why certain fandom tags on Tumblr are chock-full of posts where people just throw out something of the sort without developing it. I assume they feel the need to get it out of their system without necessarily turning it into fic. It's something I find difficult to talk about because my brain doesn't usually work like that (also because I just don't seem to have headcanons to merit the name, lol; each fic is its own thing in my mind, so if character X has motivation A in fic 1, the same X in a similar situation might actually have a motivation B in fic 2 -- I tend not to set things in stone even when I'm fond of a certain interpretation. Idk!) But then the Tumblr method might suggest another way of dealing with headcanons if fic isn't cutting it, which is simply posting them somewhere. Not to someone in particular, but somewhere, anywhere, and if an online wanderer happens to spot it and say something about it, great, and if they don't that's great too as the thing will have been exorcised (?). It's a theory (albeit not the most elegant one, sorry, haha). At the very least you'd know for certain that you wouldn't be "imposing" on anyone via PMs and it is DEFINITELY better than restraining your own excitement for canon on behalf of others, as that can and, by the looks of it, will have an impact on your fun... Which isn't fair either!

I must say that people who have stopped posting but not writing intrigue me -- I usually stop writing altogether when I get as demotivated as all that. I do hang on to fic for posting later on, usually for inane reasons that make sense only to me (including but not limited to "this story I wrote and love contains the juggernaut ship and jesus god I do NOT want those fans reading it, I can't deal with that right now, lol"), but if disillusionment with the fandom comes to a point where I'd stop posting for lack of connection then I'm likely to stop writing at all, preferring to imagine things without committing to writing. Truth be told, that's when another fandom has higher chances of hooking me -- smaller than the other one though it may be!

I'd have to sit down and try to look into my own attitude at length to see if there's any coping mechanism list to write up and compare to yours, haha, because right now it's just been more or less automatic to power through my rarepair/tiny fandom hell. Different moments in different fandoms have also been fuelled by different actions, so it's not like there's some sort of panacea either... So, for now, looking at your list, 6 and 4 are the least feasible, to me anyway. 3 is perhaps preferable but not always possible (although I WILL say that writing + posting something for fandom Y in place of X every now and again helps ME -- it freshens things up, whether Y is bigger than X or not [!], meaning that Y can be even smaller than X already is and that getting 0 comments on that can still be therapeutic instead of getting no reaction on X. That doesn't make any logical sense, I know, but it works for me, LOL).

That leaves 1, 2 and 5, with 5 being my own method of choice. It lets me be petty. Pettiness, I'm not ashamed to say it, is a BIG motivator for me, lol. No one needs to know I'm being petty. "Fuck all of you heathens who dismiss my absolute brilliance, now you shall have none of it, not unless I take pity on your sorry souls and magnanimously change my mind!" -- the more I can sound like a cartoon villain in my head, the more satisfying it is. It lets me take a step back and poke fun at the whole situation, I suppose -- at my own illusions of grandeur, at thinking any of this is serious in the first place (it's fanfic! It's meant to be fun!), etc -- and that little bit of mischievous fun can sometimes hold me through a rough patch precisely for bringing humour back into it.

... So I'm not sure that was helpful at all. I might try and ponder a bit more and write something more coherent some other time. Sitting here trying not to blast the character limit on comments, I think there might be something to be said about going offline, too, since I know that even talking to friends about The Obsession can occasionally get in the way of The Obsession itself. Sometimes I need to take time off. I don't love the thing any less but I need a breather -- watch a film, read a book that has nothing to do with the fandom in any way, listen to music, do some sports... Something far away from the internet, from fandom spaces. It's like a reset. The brain gets something new to chomp on for a few hours and the Obsession abstinence kicks in and makes me want to hurry back to my desk even if no one else will read that 80k tiny fandom fic, LOL. See? Not helpful! It's all contradictory!

In any case, I'm sending you hugs. You're not alone! Tiny fandoms can be demanding as much as they are rewarding and I think it's normal to just sigh and really feel how different it is to a larger environment. It's hard not to miss the buzzing, the constant novelties, the overall activity... But, and I don't need to tell you this, there's a sense of cosiness, a pleasure to tiny fandoms that big ones don't allow for (maybe if you're into a very niche rarepair, lol, been there done that). There's always going to be bumps along the ride. They just don't cancel out how good a ride it ultimately is -- or so I think :)

[vriddy]

(This will be long. As usual. SORRY! ^^;)

How dare you!! I demand an immediate retraction of this apology, do you know me at all?! XD Thank you for all the insights and food for thought, as always! ♡

I understand what you mean about being hard on oneself, but at the same time I've seen too many similar discussions turn into "well the problem is that people suck, and their tastes suck, and so does their behaviour" which accomplishes nothing. But yeah, that AND ALSO it's okay to want things, sometimes XD I actually really liked your framing of trying to recreate a past, positive experience. It feels different than just stomping feet and going "no likey, no happy!!" (although that's a valid reaction to, as you phrase it, realising one is not having the fun they wished they were XD)

You're not the only person I know talking about exorcising ideas by sharing them in whatever form somewhere! I guess maybe I wasn't/amn't ready to just free myself of the ideas (not in the sense "I don't want anyone to steal it!!" -- omg the opposite please everyone steal away and write your takes on all the things, all the cakes, I want to check it all out) but in the sense that I still hold the foolish hope that I'll be writing them. Because this is what I do, how I do things, how I exist in fandom. But maybe I need to forget about the #3 type of ideas for the time-being, when things feel like that 🤔 Whether I do find a way to throw away my current headcanons, there'll always be more XD

I know of at least 4 people who still write but don't post, although I'm including myself in that too XD It's when the writing still feels good and satisfying, but whatever (doesn't) come after does not. Obviously I would 100000% pick this option always over "hates writing and loves posting" XD but maybe it'll all turn out into an extended extra version of "DISTANCE!" until there isn't much or any remaining feeling attached to it. I like your petty reason example haha I think I get it XD

I'd have to sit down and try to look into my own attitude at length to see if there's any coping mechanism list to write up and compare to yours, haha, because right now it's just been more or less automatic to power through my rarepair/tiny fandom hell.

*whispers* Teach me your magic XD Well if anything else comes to mind at any time, I'll be eagerly looking forward to your thoughts here or elsewhere :D I think I hadn't really needed to do that kind of analysis either until it suddenly became a problem for me. I didn't really realise my different motivations for writing/sharing fic either; I thought there was only one.

I'd have to sit down and try to look into my own attitude at length to see if there's any coping mechanism list to write up and compare to yours, haha, because right now it's just been more or less automatic to power through my rarepair/tiny fandom hell.

I think I accidentally did that when posting also for Spring Thunder, alas it's just the same misery in a different flavour in the end XD Do nurture and cherish your superpowers :D

Method #5 is probably the easiest one and is also totally under one's control, too... I like your petty persona XD It adds a meta layer of fun. It sounds better than beating oneself up over things anyway (as long as it doesn't spill into how one treats other fans, of course, not that I think you'd fall victim to that, just thinking aloud!!).

Maybe I'm in the "distance from Obsession" phase and I'll only come back to it more rejuvenated in a few weeks :D Thank you for the hugs and again for sharing all the thoughts!!

[senmut]

I... am in that point of stop posting. I have written what I want, I had mild engagement, and now it's all variations on a theme I want to play with. What if I had done X instead of Y in that concept? So I play with those ideas on my own, never share them.

Briefly had a pull back into my mega fandom, and the fact that my corner is getting less than 0 engagement pushed me right back out, to the point I didn't even write three of the bunnies I had.

I am very much in a slump of ideas vs engagement vs inspiration, and while I am enjoying the new-old fandom I am currently watching (Sense8), I don't feel a need to write or read in it.

I have had cycles like this before. Eventually what will happen is that I will find a fandom that does get engagement, go bonkers in it, post all the bits and pieces of my other fandoms alongside the bonkers one, and get engagement for all as people will test waters in smaller fandoms if they like you bigger ones, I find.

[vriddy]

Being able to recognise cycles sounds super helpful! I guess this is my first rodeo into tiny-fandom-and-only-tiny-fandom-land and I find myself kind of making sad noises flapping the water in my tiny pond and wondering if things will always feel like this. Keeping the tiny fandom fic until I happen to be pulled into a big fandom again is a very intriguing thought! Although it seems to take me years between fandom obsessions, so I'm not too sure how or if that'll work out.

to the point I didn't even write three of the bunnies I had.

Argh, that's such a lousy feeling *hugs* I guess that's one of the things I also struggle with because there's kind of a sense of loss that comes with it? With different external circumstances (as unfortunate as relying on that might be), these stories would have got written... I guess maybe when one has written for long enough, maybe it's easier to accept it just works out that way sometimes? It kinda feels the same way than how I abhor deleting words, haha.

[mistressofmuses]

Unfortunately, I usually get tangled up in the "why share?" bit when it comes to very small fandoms (or otherwise obscure choices, like a weird crossover.) If I don't imagine there's someone out there who wants to read it, then I usually just keep it as a daydream, and never even make it to writing it, much less sharing it.

BUT. If I can manage to get the fannish bug again (I am so sad that it's been so long since I had serious inspiration to write fic!) I'm hoping to maybe go for it, even if it's for a micro fandom, or a super rarepair, or whatever. But I have to get the fannish bug before that becomes plausible!

(Basically all my fic writing has been for solidly mid-size fandoms. Never super big fandoms or juggernaut ships (or at least not by the time I was poking my head in), but never super tiny, either.)

[vriddy]

Mid-size is probably the ideal fandom size, the wank isn't as overwhelming, but there's still a bunch of people around to get excited with? :D I found writing once-off short-ish one-shots for tiny fandoms worked well until now, but camping there sure is something else. For a single fic that doesn't make me half a lifetime to write, it feels easier to believe there is one (1) other weirdo out there who will find it eventually, so I do it... but sustaining it makes it harder to sustain the lie to myself? XD Idk!! Haha. I do hope you find yourself filled with fannish feelings again soon, and for a pleasant and decently-sized fandom!! :)

[rhoda_rants]

Well, you know how well *I'm* coping!! (Meaning: not very!)

Seriously, thank you for this. So much of this is exactly what I've been churning through my brain lately. It is about community, and with social media being the way it is nowadays, it is harder than ever to find your people. That's been the biggest shift for me I think: 15-20 years ago, when you had a small fandom, you could still find a niche GeoCities website or something for that fandom, and that's where your people were. But on DW? I literally keep forgetting what all my various mutuals are into.

And I'm the same way: I have lots of different fandoms. My Ao3 page has less than 20 stories on it, but there are 10 different fandoms represented. And half of them are crossovers! And some of my longest, most evergreen fandoms aren't in there at all.

There are a couple that I know I'm on my own with. I don't expect much engagement, here or elsewhere, and I'm sort of . . . not okay with that, but it does mean that if I'm seized by the urge to do a retrospective or something, I just have to resign myself to the rest of my people here checking their collective watches until I get it out of my system.

I will say the reason this Vampire Chronicles thing I've been complaining about is bugging me so much, is I thought the fandom was bigger? Or at least more of my friends here were into it and would be willing to geek out with me? I had plenty of people in the comments with me when I was talking about it in the past. But now? It keeps dropping off. And I don't get it. Where'd they all go? Is my timing just bad? Am I doing too much at once? Did I misjudge how many people actually read the books as well as watching the show and they have no idea what I'm talking about when I reference certain chapters that Changed My Entire Life? (Do people really not know what the phrase "Savage Garden" comes from??) I HOPE people will come back when the new season comes out. I guess we'll see. Because my obsession with it is only going to get worse.

I tried to pretend I have an archivist mindset, doesn't matter if anyone reads it, but I can't quiiiite pull it off.

I've tried this same thing, and it just did not work for me. There is a pattern for which stories get more attention on Ao3 at least: Doctor Who, Stranger Things, and X-Men. In that order. Those fans will find me and say nice things. Everything else is a crapshoot. But I can't just commit to writing for only the most popular fandoms. That's not how my mind works. My ideas chew on me until I put them somewhere. I have always had stories that I never post. I've written several that never make it out of my hard drive, or my notebooks in some cases, including one that I wrote on a legal pad and then threw away. Those are just "for me" and I don't have plans to share them, ever. I just needed them out of my head. When I post it, that's different. I want to start a conversation, pretty much every time.

For what it's worth, I don't think there's a "secret" to sustain this. Because here's the thing: It's not sustainable. This era of fandom is bad. Everyone I've talked to, writers and readers alike, HATES this. Something's going to break eventually. I don't know what that's going to look like. I think we just need to weather it until we figure out a better way to engage with each other.

Oh, but set your account to private. Yes, that means people can't find you without creating an account and logging in, but it keeps the bots out.

[vriddy]

It does feel like it should be a bigger fandom... Maybe a case of people hanging out in different places? It feels like discord may be one of the main places where fans speak more freely in depth, but it's impossible to find unless you're lucky and know the right people... (though I wonder if people on vampiremedia may have recs). Of course, the real-time conversation aspect itself is a massive problem for people who can't be online at the exact right time.

But I can't just commit to writing for only the most popular fandoms. That's not how my mind works.

Likewise, haha. I think most fans are the same. I can maybe nudge, but if the underlying bubbling feelings aren't there to carry me, it's just gonna be a different kind of unpleasant.

Most of the bots I get have accounts, unfortunately, and I see their scam comments on locked fic as well. On the plus side, that makes them easier to report and get banned, which AO3 has been pretty prompt about. Even if the stupid bot account kudo remains visible ;C

Thank you for your thoughts and commiseration, and wishing you the best through this too! Some periods just are more unpleasant to weather than others, I suppose.

[brightly_lit]

I'm a believer in coping mechanisms #3 and something like #4. Even when I was in a huge fandom, posting a fic a week, and getting pretty good response, every now and then I'd write a fic no one was into. In fact, it was usually the fic I wrote right after I wrote one that was extraordinarily popular. Sometimes I could see why; in other cases I'm still kinda baffled. So nowadays I participate in a pretty widely read annual fic exchange for that large fandom so I know at least some of the fics I write will have readers, and I try to write something for that that people will actually like lol, which makes me feel better about writing fics for other fandoms that aren't going to have many if any readers.

In terms of #4 Mindset Change, I have various methods of addressing the problem that involve a mindset change. I write a lot of original fiction, which is hard for anyone to find readers for, so if that's not getting readers, I'm pretty okay with it, and at least I had the freedom to do exactly what I wanted in every respect without having to cleave to canon. Thus, if I have an unpopular/complicated idea, or one for a fandom where my fic probably won't get read, anyway, I'll just write it as original fiction if I can. I couldn't with my novel-length fic because the whole idea revolved quite specifically around the show's concepts, but these days, if nobody's gonna read it anyway, may as well write whatever I like as original fiction! With the added bonus that at least if someone does someday read it, I'll get paid for it.

Then there's also the simple fact that response is not *truly* where the value of art lies. It feels amazing when someone else shares your feeling, or validates your creation, but you felt the feeling yourself when you wrote it and that's the most precious thing; you'll never be able to *feel* the appreciative reader's feelings, only imagine from what they say what they might be. As for validation, it's awesome when someone talks about the fic's strengths or the best moments or beautifully expressed parts, but that's just validation, you saying, "YEAH, I KNEW that part was awesome!!" -- but again, you already knew it was awesome; their saying it just reinforces that knowledge.

But writing for yourself is probably the most important. I wrote and posted the aforementioned novel-length fic that no one has read all the way through -- not a soul -- and I'm okay with it because I so desperately needed to write that fic and I adore it. If I'm its only adoring reader ever, so be it.

[vriddy]

That is such an interesting take, balancing tiny fandoms with original fiction! I've been noticing myself drifting back more fully toward my original projects, both because it feels like it has more readers potential (because 5 people volunteered to beta-read my witch project: even if only 3 are able to do it in the end, that's still more readers than my tiny fandom fic can get!), and also because like you say, the expectations in terms of readerships are much lower by default.

I think most of my fic ideas for the tiny fandoms are still too dependent on the canon characters being what they are and how they are, in the world they are. The "What if??" questions are very canon-dependent. From past patterns though, I tend to drift into AU ideas a bit later for any given fandom, which is when it starts to feel a little bit easier to adapt into something else.

As for validation, it's awesome when someone talks about the fic's strengths or the best moments or beautifully expressed parts, but that's just validation, you saying, "YEAH, I KNEW that part was awesome!!" -- but again, you already knew it was awesome; their saying it just reinforces that knowledge.

I guess I don't have that knowledge or conviction 🤔 I know when I enjoyed writing something, and when I enjoyed re-reading it (usually after some editing), but until I've shared it and someone else says "I enjoyed this too" I don't actually know if it's "good" as in, I guess, did the writing achieve its purpose of creating a good experience for someone else? Is it actually understandable and enjoyable by others? Having said that, I don't think it's all that ideal to rely on others to be able to believe "Maybe what I'm doing isn't all that shit??" either, but it seems to be where I'm at in general 🤔 Something to else to work on, though that goes beyond the scope of keeping life sustainable in tiny fandoms, haha. I guess there are too many times when I've been very sure about something but actually very wrong, so I can't help but glance around and ask in a whisper, "Right??" about most things. Heh.

Really appreciate you sharing your thoughts and offering such an interesting perspective, I'm adding all the food for thought to the stuff I'm considering!!

[mxcatmoon]

Ah, a post that's right up my alley. I am, of course, going through the curse of hyperfixation on a small (almost non-existent) fandom, as is obvious from anyone who has read my journal lately. 😉

I know the pain. Every day I go to AO3 and click on the fandom tag to see the latest fic posted... is mine. It's always mine, damn it! 😒😀 I'm not sure I have any advice to give, though. Why do I do it? 1. I'm obsessed, and the muses won't leave me alone. 2. If I want to read the fic (I do!!) I have to write it myself. 3. I live in hope that the fandom will have a renaissance (yes, even though it's OLD).

I'm used to amusing myself alone, so I've been having a lot of fun (though, of course, it would be even more fun with more engagement). I feel most alive when I'm being super creative and inspired, and I don't get to choose which shows affect me like that. It's still a bummer sometimes, but I persist. I post my fic, and inundate my Tumblr blog with 99% of all the things posted for that fandom. I post screencaps and episode recaps, and I've gotten to the point where I'll get several likes a day/maybe the occasional reblog (just not much actual conversation happening sadly). But it motivates me, because I feel like I'm making progress with getting more people interested in the show, and maybe one day someone will become as obsessed as I am. Ulterior motives!

Do you post things about your fandom on Tumblr? You could even make a side blog, if you felt more comfortable with that. Just post all your headcanons, squee about everything you want. Explore other ways to be creative and post? I've been doing old-school title banners for some of my fic.

I also consider it my legacy, my tiny slice of immortality. Maybe one day, 100 years from now, someone might stumble across one of my fics, and it will make them feel something. Have a laugh, or be cheered up from a bad day... It's all I have to offer the world, and I kinda like it.

Well, that's about all I have to add. I just do it because I can't not do it.

[vriddy]

Every day I go to AO3 and click on the fandom tag to see the latest fic posted... is mine.

Sad fistbump XD (Although it's no longer mine at the moment for one of them (YAY!), but nothing else since :D)

I've been shadow-banned from Tumblr for years, so I'm not very pushed to contribute there... (People who already follow my blog can see the posts, but I don't think others can in any of the tags. My comments don't display on other people's posts, and I can't send any ask to anyone, not even myself!) The first time that happened, Support fixed it after a few months. This time my ticket has gone unanswered in years... So I'd need start a new account from 0, knowing that the same thing is possibly going to happen again. Also, it doesn't look like the fandom is active over there either, I found maybe 3 posts in the last year?? K-9 is a tough keyword to search for though haha, mostly Doctor Who stuff comes up XD I checked the other tags on the 3 posts I found (people don't know which tag to use!) but no luck.

I like your idea of talking more about canon though. At least one friend of mine is back from the life trenches and we can get excited about canon together again which feels SO GOOD! I need to accept/remember that not every idea must become a story, even if it feels frustrating. I can make posts here too, like when I did for the Leopard and Tree characters, and maybe clean them up a bit to post on relevant comms... Like, making sure my interest in canon remains joyful (I was really bummed out when everyone else disappeared 🥲) if nothing else! The rest will follow, or not.

I just do it because I can't not do it.

I guess I thought that was where I was at, but the negative feelings around posting/talking into the void grew so big they kind of eclipsed everything else. I feel like writing this post and then thinking through what everyone has kindly been sharing in the replies is helping me with separating where I am vs where I want to stand vs where it's all at, at least a bit XD

[dr_zook]

I had to laugh out so loud due to the horse and whale noises!! I know exactly how that went, haha. 🤣

You're probably doing things perfectly right, from an individual's perspective? I'm almost exclusively writing in tiniest fandoms, which sucks very much. It definitely helps writing for certain people, because sometimes even receiving only one nice feedback is better than anonymous keysmash--but anonymous keysmash is, of course, better than nothing.

I know about at least two fandoms I started tags for in the Archive, and being the first and only one there was really lonesome. Throughout the years more and more writers popped up, and I guess they're all younger and used to another kind of etiquette, because when I commented on one of their stories recently they first replied, "Thank you!", and the second one was, "Wait WAIT aren't you the one who wrote magnificent [that first story in the archive]?? I FEEL HONOURED," and I was like, yeah, nice to let me know NOW. How about dropping a comment under that story you liked so much instead of gushing whereever about it? Anyway, what I wanted to say is probably: please don't stop posting. Every late bloomer of a specific fandom will be happy there is something already if they're out to find morsels for their latest obsession. ♥

PS: I definitely understand stopping writing tiny fandoms altogether. I've been there very often, and it makes my own enthusiasm trickle out, I guess. But sometimes there is that ONE scene that has to be put to paper, and maybe that's your whole writing contribution to that fandom, and that's super OK!!

[vriddy]

I do not have any horse or whale icon, a terrible oversight on my part clearly!! Thank you for the kind words and thoughts :D

I've also experienced people telling me they read my fic only in replies to comments I left on their own stories, especially in the BNHA fandom (...actually sort of the same once in K-9 too). The only such comment that made me laugh a few years ago is when they also asked me in marriage in a very funny way as part of the reply XD But yeah, talking about fic elsewhere without mentioning anything to the author seems to be more of a thing for a variety of reasons, too, which doesn't really help.

Every late bloomer of a specific fandom will be happy there is something already if they're out to find morsels for their latest obsession. ♥

See, if I could convince myself that the late bloomer might take a moment to let me know about that... XD I think that kind of spirit works for me to write "the one fic" for a given fandom or tiny ship, but not to sustain myself and keep it up over time for a single fandom :/

It's my first time staying in a tiny fandom like this over so many fic (K-9 shot up to my second most written fandom very quickly XD). I guess maybe, one of the pieces of learning about myself is that no matter my level of enthusiasm, it will peter out if I don't find anyone else to play with in the fandom, and so maybe next time I should stay aware of that and prioritise more carefully which ideas I write, so I'm not disappointed if I can't get to some of them because writing "just for myself" becomes too difficult once chatting to the void gets too hard 🤔🤔🤔

[groundwiremantaray]

Very interesting topic, thanks for writing this post!

A lot of the writing I've done for my (large overall but I hang out in a smaller subset) "main fandom" was motivated by fandom-specific events and in some case prompts, so I definitely appreciate a community when there's one to be had. But for me, participating in fandom at all is anomalous compared to my default of "write bits and pieces of stories that then gather dust on my hard drive."

In smaller fandoms, I guess I've been doing the preemptive version of coping mechanism #1, which is to write but never post. Since I tend to write just the fun parts of stories, it'd take a lot more work to get those fragments into a post-worthy state, which doesn't really feel worth the time and effort (at least for now). If I ever do decide to polish up and post those small fandom stories, then it'd turn into coping mechanism #5. I think this lag time would help in terms of separating the "joy and/or frustration from writing" from the "joy and/or frustration from connecting/not connecting with other fans" - in the sense of, even if no one ever reads or comments on the story, at least I got to enjoy the standalone satisfaction of writing the story without it being overshadowed by not getting any response. But I haven't actually posted any such fics so I don't know how well this would work in practice ^^'

[vriddy]

You're welcome, thanks for taking a moment to share your thoughts!! Fandom-specific events sound like a great way to enjoy a bit of "Community Batteries (usually) Included" time :D

I suspect strategy #5 / giving it more time and distance is one of the healthier approaches overall, although it's also a different way to enjoy fandom compared to what it can be like during the Wild/Feverish Times. But one must accept the cards one was given :D

[adore]

FELT. Big hugs, I've found myself in this fannish position often. Nowadays whenever I feel fannish about something in a way that makes me want to read and write fic, it's usually a k-drama. And those all tend to be tiny fandoms. Usually even though I feel long-term love for a k-drama I only write maybe a singular one-shot for it and yeet it into the AO3 void. And it's always the toss of a coin whether I'll get a comment from a fellow fan on it.

I have a oneshot for The Sound of Magic which was read and commented on solely by a couple of Dreamwidth friends who didn't watch the drama, and only a year since the fic was posted did someone who saw the drama find it and comment. On the other hand, my fic for the k-movie Love & Leashes is my most kudosed fic, even though iirc my fic was one of the first for the tag, even though Korean movies are less popular and make less money than Korean dramas. I expected crickets like with my k-drama fics but the opposite happened. That's the exception, but what it does for me is that when I post a fic to A03 for a new-to-me k-fandom I don't really, truly know whether the readership appears nonexistent or is actually nonexistent. Theoretically it's the toss of a coin, although in reality it's mostly the latter.

Neither of the experiences I've mentioned above have translated to a fannish community, though. That's the nature of A03 that you'll have cruise-by connections and that's it. I rarely make friends based on mutual fannish interest nowadays because how do you even start. I have days when I feel like a lonely fangirl, but I'm kind of lonely in general and I've gotten used to fangirling almost alone. I suppose my coping mechanism is flinging a one-shot up and flying by, cycling through fandoms quickly. Because k-drama are short and usually only one season, I can do that. And while I bounce off some dramas and watch others without becoming fannish about them, eventually I'll happen upon a drama that gives me those big feelings again. And I'll post a squee here on my Dreamwidth journal for the couple of friends who also watch k-dramas, although we don't always overlap on which ones we watch or like, and I might post a one-shot and then that's it. It's back to fangirling in my head for me.

Recently I had a lovely interaction where I squeed about a k-drama and bemoaned the lack of fix-it fic for it (involving a better wrapping up of the end and a kiss between the romantic leads, which the drama didn't have) and then I found a fix-it fic involving the elements I was craving, and it was written by one of my Dreamwidth mutuals who had watched the drama and written the fic for a Yuletide request! Moments like that feel magical because what are the chances. They happen rarely but perhaps that makes it more magical.

[vriddy]

Thanks for the kind words, and for sharing your experience and how you go through it, too! I find it easier when it's just a single fic or two for a tiny fandom. Though I suppose for you, it's nearly like "K-drama" is the main fandom so maybe it doesn't feel different enough.

HOW SUPER COOL to find the fix-it you were looking for and written by someone you knew, too :D Yeah... those moments are magical. Maybe I should appreciate them more for what they are, and stop noticing how non-magical other times can be and how I wish for the magic to happen again, heh.

[kalloway]

I had to get through the weekend before commenting, but- I am well-aware I am an outlier and should not be counted anyway because I really am that person gleefully posting stuff to maybe one random DW comm and my archive and that's it. No need for comments or anything. I am free. (Mostly. Because I will admit that every now and then I do wish someone would comment on my incredibly obscure shit but I also know that at best someone will read it fandom-blind and while that's nice, idk, I think that for me, the joy is in the creation.)

Like, my icon is Siegfried from Knights of Avalon, a fairly simple browser-based Japanese-only mobage/social game that ended service in 2023. I loved that game. I do not expect anyone, literally anyone, to have any idea what it is or was or why it was so amazing (to me). In the icon, Siegfried is performing a purification, which was part of a monthly event. She's otherwise the Japanese Siegfried-trope, so the purification ability is ??? but I like to think about it. I could write a thousand words of Siegfried doing her monthly subjugation and purification and then getting a drink with her pal Bedivere and that is the joy. Remembering and creating for the thing that I love is what does it for me. And then I get to archive it and re-read it whenever I want. A thousand words remembering this cool thing from this cool game.

But I also run a lot of multi-fandom communities and events and while I am not quite at the point of Fandom is My Fandom, I am at the point of 'here are places that all of us with big or little or tiny or dead fandoms can do our thing and at least we're all in the same room even if we're all making vastly differing things'. (I mean, sometimes I throw events and nobody turns up and that's also fine. I tried! You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.)

This is a lot of words to say that doing the thing means a lot more to me than the reaction to me doing the thing. I certainly wasn't always that way; I've mellowed with time and experience.

[vriddy]

You sound like someone who totally should be counted, and the kind of person I'm hoping to glean insights from :D I guess I'm hoping to figure out what kind of perspective shift helps with becoming more zen about this all, like you seem to be. It can't just be temperament, can it?? 🤔 Although "mellowing with time and experience" is another good point. I suppose, although I was sharing fic in the times of HTML-only archives with no commenting system, I had such a long break before coming back as an active fandom participant a few years ago, that maybe I just need to go through the full lifecycle at whatever pace it'll take.

Like, my icon is Siegfried from Knights of Avalon, a fairly simple browser-based Japanese-only mobage/social game that ended service in 2023.

I love that for you, and I think that's sort of related to what I have going on that's new to me: I'm now regularly reading more and more very new manga, some of which may never be translated, but which also generally have a much much smaller audience in the English-speaking sphere because they are so recent. I need to get used to my new landscape!! That'll take a bit.

[corvidology]

Well, your post made me think about stuff I don't usually think much about so thanks for that. :D

My 'large' fandom loves are relatively large compared to most of my fandom loves but considered medium sized at best by others, like Person of Interest... or they're technically large fandoms but for canons that are so old there's not much visible/happening anymore, like The Professionals or the TV version of Man from U.N.C.L.E.

I don't even have many mates who share any of my tiny fandoms beyond the 'I watched it and enjoyed it' level at best or they're mostly active in their large fandoms. The funny thing is, I have written ficlets/drabbles for megafandoms to amuse mates and while the number of responses I see for those is pretty incredible to me it's still a 'tiny' response in megafandom terms.

The great majority of my fandoms are teeny tiny and in many cases I wrote the first story for them/still have the only story for them.

I think it helps(?) that my default is writing short(er) length fan fiction anyway so it naturally feels like less of a time investment rather than my having to repress my burning desire to write long fic for my fandoms of one/fandoms of fans you could count on one hand.

I do post most of what I write for them because of that fan thing of going looking for fan fiction about something I've enjoyed only to find nothing.

I haven't posted any fan fiction since the beginning of January but that has to do with life stuff rather than just giving up. /end ramble

I think if it bothers you then you shouldn't feel bad about not writing it or at least not posting it. You don't owe anyone else anything but I do think you owe yourself feeling good about how you spend your free time. ♥

[vriddy]

I do post most of what I write for them because of that fan thing of going looking for fan fiction about something I've enjoyed only to find nothing.

I super feel that for fandoms that have zero fic! But I'm finding it mega-difficult to sustain. K-9 has 25 fics on AO3 at the moment, 17 of them are mine... And if the circumstances were different, it seems like I could have kept it up for longer. I guess that post, and working through My Feelings (tm) around all this with folks in the comments, is about learning to make my peace that this isn't going to happen (even though it seems like it could have! Even though I wish it did! I wish I could just keep pottering along soaked in my tiny fandom joy, with little influence from what's going on (or not as the case appears to be) around me!).

Appreciate your thoughts a lot, as someone more familiar/experienced than I am with Life In Tiny Fandoms ♡

[phantomtomato]

First and foremost, my sympathies and thoughts as you’re going through a tough fandom period! It really is just part of the small fandom/small pairing cycle, but that doesn’t make it any easier to deal with, emotionally, when you’re there. I’m sorry that it’s getting to you and I hope that you move on to another stage soon! <3

I love your writing-about-writing, and this post was such a good read. Sorry if that sounds weird to say! But I connect with your brand of introspection or self-reflection, and this was all very nicely-put.

I’ve been a longtime fan of tiny fandoms and tiny pairings, and forgive me if this sounds obvious, but what’s helped make that not feel so lonely is getting my social engagement in some other part of life. It’s kind of like how plenty of people do some sort of arts and crafts hobby (knitting for me!) without a necessary social component, just as something that happens in their downtime. This is a different way of Doing Fandom, for sure, and means for me less overall time spent on it, since I’m not bouncing ideas off of other fans or reading social media posts, fic, or looking at art. That can feel like a loss. But when I really am the only active fan of something, I think of it more like facing my reality: I need socialization over shared interests, and that will have to be some other interest. Takes the pressure of of fandom to be that venue, and I do write less, but I’m less bothered by the concept of ‘reception’ for my writing.

[vriddy]

I appreciate you slipping in a "this was a good read" paragraph in there, since after a few days I was starting to reach the self-consciousness stage of the post XD <3 I guess, initially, I was spiralling more and more unproductively about all this, so writing a post as fair as possible about where I am standing, with ideally a few ideas on paths forward so my future self doesn't stay stuck if/when I hit this again and come back to reread, was my way of working through it.

Thank you for the kind words as well! And for the ideas on finding socialisation in another hobby altogether, kinda like #3 supercharged...!! In a way, maybe this is Dreamwidth for me? 🤔 I don't think of long discussions here in terms of "reception" (especially since the initial post is written for me and my future self first - I guess quite similar to stories when that's going well!), but I really appreciate how folks are happy to bounce on my posts, help me think through things, offer different perspectives and shared experiences, and just... yeah I guess the connection I was talking about XD But chewing slowly through all of this delicious food for thought until I can digest it is something I really enjoy doing. Luxurious!!

Not totally sure that helped with the writing either (although I got at least one new K-9 plot bunny out of it XD), but it did clarify a lot of things for me and took me out of my head so I can move on. "Facing my reality" indeed :D Thanks again!

saw this on scifirenegade's page and had to fly over :3

[thefruitbat]

waves from another tiny fandom

It's indeed a struggle sometimes. And yes, at least one person to bounce around ideas and maybe beta each other's fics (and just in general chat about the shared fandom) is SO important.

I don't mind not having that much engagement, but I don't think I'd be really happy if there was zilch. Like you mentioned, I write mainly because I want to share my headcanon and plots and fix plot holes (my fandom has a metric shit-ton of those), but it really makes my day when a fellow fandom writer chirps in, comments or offers concrit.

There are also some bigger and one big fandom I write in, and there's more engagement, but the one, tiny, (first) fandom, that's where my heart is. That's why engagement in it makes me extra happy.

[So, if you like police procedural shows from the 90's and vampires... Wanna take a look at Forever Knight? 😉👮‍♂️🧛‍♂️🦇]

Re: saw this on scifirenegade's page and had to fly over :3

[vriddy]

Thank you for dropping by and sharing your perspective! :D Yeah, having at least one outlet that involves other people really really helps with staying in the tiny fandom, doesn't it just?? It's harder to sustain the loud enthusiasm over time without it.

My door is currently closed for new tiny fandoms as I am suffering enough 🤣🤣 Wishing you the best with yours, sounds like a fun time :D

[sodium_amytal]

(here from meta_warehouse)
YES. THE STRUGGLE. 😭I've been in my tiny fandom/rarepair for like 3 years now. I'm still not sure how I'm still here. Spite, maybe? XD
how do you do it? And how do you keep it up? How do you manage the psychology of it? Do you have down moments regardless of the joy of it, and how do you handle those??
I have Sad Boi Hours/Months. I'll stop writing/posting/making stuff for a few months, usually around December-March (seasonal depression club, ayooo). I'll try to fill my time with other stuff: games, reading, movies/TV. It's definitely not fun, and the Two Wolves inside me are warring (the Wolf of genuinely feeling good/alive when I create something vs the Wolf of "Why Bother"). I, too, create/share for connection, but after some bad experiences over the last few years + the general state of online fandom, I think I'll have to put that old horse out to pasture, so to speak. It's just not reasonable/viable anymore, imo. Especially in small fandoms/rarepairs.

Having a backup fandom might help lol but my brain just doesn't want to work that way rn.

I do keep coming back to my blorbos, though, I guess because some stories just won't leave my brain unless I put them down on digital paper. And writing is a nice way for me, at least, to have a fun little story to read, even if I never share it. I have at least one fic I may never post because it's Too Vulnerable On Main xD
I also write as a form of pseudo therapy, and sometimes the lack of engagement hurts more because by writing/sharing those fics, I want witness (someone to go "OMG ME TOO" or resonate with the emotional arc) because I'm processing emotions by writing and sort of baring a wound. So the stakes are higher than just posting a fluffy/smutty oneshot.

This comment is getting less helpful XD so I'll stop here. I just wanted to drop in and say you're definitely not alone in rarepair hell, and it IS called hell for good reason 😆

[vriddy]

Hi, thank you for dropping by, and with such an incredibly relevant icon, too XD

As much as seasonal depression does Not Sound Fun, I wonder if this approach of taking a few months break helps with sustaining things, though?? I discovered my latest tiny fandoms in December so I'm like the opposite of you, intense winter-only fever for my hemisphere, and sort of losing steam paddling on my own now that spring is here. I do hope it won't mean I take 3 seasons off though XD 😱 Three years of sustaining tiny fandom involvement on your part though, that's pretty cool!!

I also hear you on the current state of fandom/fandom culture as well... I think this is also influencing another glut of unpleasant feelings I need to poke at and shed light on, too. Sorry to hear you've had bad experiences compounding that, too :/

I've definitely also written as a means of Processing Stuff, and it was really meaningful when one or two people Really Got It. It does up the stakes a lot. There's so much to navigate!! Really appreciate you sharing your thoughts and experience. There really is a ton to think about, and that all goes beyond just "fandom tiny me sad :C" which is why I keep poking!