[Formendacil]

My entire 'Downsian tenure (nearing 17 years) fits entirely into Mithadan's Third Chapter: Post-Movies. As such, I missed the heyday. But I did join pre-WereWolf!

Still, I think my experience of the 'Downs is "typical" insofar as it's generational. Though I missed the Movie years, I was a teenager (14, almost 15) when the FotR was released and I joined the forum where my peers--even those with three or more years on the forum--were the same age: teenagers just about coming of age whose teen years had become dominated by the Middle-earth experience. It's irrelevant to this larger picture that I was a pre-Movie, Book-first, didn't-have-a-fandom-till-the-Downs fan.

I would break my 'Downs years into three chunks that were more-or-less distinct, though they bleed together:

1. Teen Spirit! The forum was vibrant, I was online daily--well, nightly (well, nightly AND daily). This was roughly 2005-2008. This was pre-Social Media, and I was discovering who I was and so were all these other Internet Tolkien fans. This was an age when learning people's real names and seeing people's real faces was rare and generally only happened in private conversations, and there was still a stigma taken Very Seriously about meeting people you'd only known online, and I was still too young to have a chance to travel.

This was the era of Hookbill the Goomba's great race in the Mirth forum, of Werewolf appearing for the first time, of MSN and AIM chats late at night, of LiveJournal posts and Downer mutual-follows. There was still a lot of firepower in the Books forum, and occasional anger and spittle. Davem was banned and then unbanned and then banned again--and something like twenty of us unruly Millennials muttered about it on LiveJournal and PROTESTED.

2. The Social Media era. Eventually, since we'd all joined Facebook, we all got used to people's Real Names and Real Faces (the 40 or so that all friended each other, anyway). This was the era of Moots, since my generation was a little older and braver and had a little more money--and not too much responsibility yet. For me, this is era was 2008-2012ish. I met Brinn in person one summer, then Fëanor of the Peredhil the next, then Bostonmoot, then I changed countries for grad school, got engaged to someone met through the 'Downs, roommated with another 'Downer, had a near-Moot of a Wedding--and the entire trajectory of my life and the existence of my children now is because of this website.

This era was a bit quieter than the previous one: the slide between youthful post-Moviehood where there was still plenty of time to drown the website in youthful enthusiasm--and the later era of busy adulthood. Werewolf may have been a bit less frequent, but there were still regular games and growing frighteningly complex at times. People would fall of the face of the Earth, but in ones and twos, and they'd come back to find the community still bustling.

3. And then there's... now. People don't fall off the face of the forum singly, but only return singly. Real Life has enveloped people like me for the better part of a decade: nearly 35 years old, nearly a decade out of grad school, nearly a decade married--with all the pressures and demands this includes. For those of us who remain, the Downs is the same as ever, but the crests of each wave are days apart not minutes. Werewolf is becoming an annual event, if that, and the rest of the forum likewise adds to itself only intermittently.

We find comfort in the 'Downs still being here, and however long we return (weeks where once it was hours--indeed, the difference of the three eras for me might be Check Hourly, Check Daily, Check Weekly). It's harder to find energy to post when real life involves more intellectual drain and more demands on my time. There are more distractions in the world, from politics to pandemics to streaming services.

Where once the off-site elements just added to the swelter of the community, now they come a bit too close to replacing it. In truth, though, even those media are wearing old, and I'm only still on Facebook because I am an exile keeping up with home and because I'm a Downer who still finds social media fun because Encaitare or [/b]Boro[/b] or Lalwendë fill my timeline rather than Angry Relatives and Acquaintances.

This last stage has had occasional scares, where the forums goes down, and we all dread the day when no one can find The Barrow-Wight to wake it back up once again. One of the real joys I'm looking forward to post-pandemic (whenever we draw that line) is A Moot Again! They've been fewer in this era, but almost better: like mixing the comfort and joy of coming back to this forum with a Found Family Reunion.