That breeze blowing your hair back is the Readercon concom's collective sigh of relief, with my voice among the loudest.

I started drafting that statement on July 28 in a desperate fit of needing to do something practical and optimistic and forward-thinking, drawing inspiration from other incidents where public apologies have been received more or less well and from related conversations about what makes for a good apology. I felt it was most important to make it clear what we were apologizing for, to refrain from explaining or justifying our actions, to apologize sincerely, to stay focused on the people who were injured, and to lay out concrete future plans for self-improvement. When Veronica's petition went up, I was heartened to see that I had already addressed five of the six points on it. (I hadn't put in anything about not retaliating against the complainants and petition-signers because the thought of reprisals had never crossed my mind.) It's been a long week since then; editing a document by committee is extraordinarily difficult, though Google Docs makes it easier with a setting that says "anyone who can see this document can comment but not otherwise make changes", and we made the last changes by vote during a concom meeting on Saturday--"it is proposed that we replace text $foo with text $bar, raise your hand if you vote to do so"--which was harder. But it's done, and it's out in the world, and I am really pleased to have my name on it and to have been part of the unanimous vote to adopt it. The reaction from the community has been terrific, further proof that we have done the right thing by our people and our event.

This absolutely could not have happened without chaiya's sterling leadership and the passionate voices of omnia_mutantur, sovay, emilytheslayer, and fjm. I am so pleased and proud to know and work with all of them. Also, as much shit as mrbelm and She Who have taken for the board's decision, I wholeheartedly commend them for immediately recognizing their error and taking swift action to set things right. They and Bob Colby have thoroughly demonstrated what it means to put injured parties first and to be committed to the future of the convention. The next time I screw something up, I hope I will handle it with as much grace, honor, and humility.

The concom meeting on Saturday ran from noon to 5:45 p.m. and was not a calm or quiet affair. X and J came in to listen in on the call (and J to vote, since he's a member of the concom), and we all hung out on my bed with our laptops, using a shared Google chat to send around comments, ideas, and lolcats whenever a bit of cheer or snark was needed. J kept us all fed, and when X got hit by vertigo he took care of her so I could stay focused on the call. While fighting off dizziness and feminist rage, X spent most of the afternoon working on specs for the next iteration of the Readercon program sign-up software. I cannot begin to express my gratitude to both of them for their unstinting support for me, each other, and the convention (which X has never even been to!).

While I am delighted that the concom will be starting a safety committee, I have already informed everyone that I have no interest in being in charge of it and can only serve on it in a low-time-commitment capacity. I look forward to being able to think about anything else for a while. (Like Mars! Eeee!) August is always my month off from Readercon things, and this year that's more important than ever. I will probably put myself forward for the board pro tem, though, if X and J give me permission. September to January (when the next annual meeting and regular election will be held) is only four months. We can do a tremendous amount of good in that time, and then I can go back to only having one life-eating volunteer gig.

Today's big thing was finally buying plane tickets for Chicon, now that I know I won't be spending the whole week begging people to give Readercon another chance. Huge relief.

Time to fall over. I swear I will catch up on sleep someday. Today was not that day. (Did I mention Mars? Eeee!)


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