You have no doubt heard the new (RootsTech) app is available.
Some of the bloggers and tweeters that you follow have probably remarked they are preparing for their play-dates with their fellow bloggers, tweeters and friends early in the new year.
Yes; it is RootsTech2014 — the mecca of genealogical gatherings. In a special way (to a very select few) it is like a family reunion … I’ll explain later.
In my much earlier days, I kept to myself and attended a handful of major conferences: Ottawa and Toronto (Ontario), Chicago (Illinois), Tampa (Florida), Trenton (New Jersey) Buffalo and New York (New York); but nothing compares to RootsTech in Salt Lake City, Utah … It is like comparing a TV dinner to your mother’s home cooking; you just don’t do that.
No, RootsTech is one of those experiences that needs to be felt, not just seen and heard. Many attendees feel like little kids in the Candy Store — there is just so much to see and not enough time to take it all in!
The crowds resemble the bustling throng of Grand Central Station or the O’Hare International Aeroport, but with one major difference. The famous are among you!
Yes, the award-winning Rockstars of Genealogy: Dick Eastman, Footnote Maven, Jen Baldwin, Lisa Louise Cooke, Thomas MacEntee, Lisa Alzo and many others, take to the halls to get to the presentation and exhibit rooms just as you do.
And you can easily recognize the first-timers in the crowd from their eardrum-piercing, fan-girl squeals.
“EEEEEEEEE! Did you see that?” one asks, as she nudges her travelling companion, “[Somebody] just bumped into me!”
“Oh, look over there!” the other one calls out. “Is that her? IT IS!”
Which is then followed by both of them squealing and jumping up and down excitedly, while Old-Timers much like me desperately dig in their laptop bags for some Advil … or earplugs.
Then, you have the strangers that began their friendships on Twitter, GeneaBloggers or GenChat, etc, who made plans to meet at RootsTech. They get together and are inseparable. And when it is time to go, they make arrangements then and there for the following year! Just like the family reunion that I mentioned above.
Unfortunately, my plans to attend these festivities have been postponed too many times, but Nostalgia would be in attendance (2014).
I prayed every night during RootsTech that everybunny survived the ordeal.
[Yes, because she is a Scream Queen.].