Anticipation...IUSA Today!

These are the good old days...
Carly Simon

by Skip Cohen

It's the first convention of the new year and my schedule is already jam packed with people I'm catching up with over the next three days. The anticipation is incredible. While I know it's only been a year since the last IUSA, it's also been a long year with minimal contact with great friends and associates. 

Plus, ever since the pandemic had us all hunkered down - like so many of you, I've missed contact. Zoom, Skype, Facetime even a phone call are great - but nothing beats actually being with friends and the buzz in the air when a good show is about to kick off.

But there is a sidebar challenge - it's recognizing faces but hitting the wall when it comes to names! Twice, last night on our way back to the room, I bumped into people I know well - did bro-hugs, the whole nine yards and couldn't remember their names until ten minutes later! So, whether it's aging, overload or too many lost brain cells at concerts in the 70s or 80s - work with me if I bump into you today! 

Oh, and one more point - if I look lost, it's probably because I am. This Gaylord Hotel is so big that their phone app has GPS. I didn't download it originally, but twice now I've realized the bread crumbs I was dropping to and from our room weren't necessary!

The bottom line is right there with Carly Simon's song - these will become the good old days the minute we leave Nashville.

If you're here, I hope to catch up to you...and if you're not at IUSA make it a great day and your own "good old days" to savor tomorrow and beyond. Go for those eleven-second therapeutic hugs with the people most important in your life and take nothing for granted.

These are the good old days.

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