2024 SDCC Exclusive Panic Attack

The mental health situation that's also a Summer Convention Exclusive™

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It was my second year at San Diego Comic Con and unlike last year, I had expectations. In 2023, I was a simple geek who was just happy to be there. In 2024, one of the booths was giving away a free t-shirt from my favorite TV show that I casually decided would fix literally every thing in my life.

And I was going to get that fucking shirt if it was the last thing I did.

(This already sounds like the introduction to a tragic poem…because it is.)

Trying to get one of The Free Things at SDCC is, as I would soon learn, a living nightmare in which you are actually sucked into one of the shittier hell dimensions. It is survival of the most psychotic. The general vibe is what I would describe as “Lifeboats on the Titanic.”

Everyone chaotically crowds the booth, trying to get the free thing like they’re trying to board a lifeboat on the deck of the Titanic. Instead of screaming, “WOMEN AND CHILDREN ONLY,” security guards shriek, “NO LINING UP” as literally 4000 people weirdly stand in one area until, suddenly, it is time to line up and no matter where you’re standing, you’re in the wrong place and can’t move and sorry, line’s full, go away.

So, you didn’t get in a lifeboat and the ship sank and you’re floating around in the ocean. Maybe if you just sneakily swim over to a boat and flop in (aka squeeze yourself into the capped line), nobody will notice? They will, though. And they will physically kick you away.

…Unfortunately, I didn’t know any of this yet.

Having no Fucking clue what I was willingly doing, I wandered over to the booth where My Wonderful Shirt was said to be. Surely, this completely free item from the widely popular show I loved would be waiting and ready for me. I would show my phone to the security guard, proving that I agreed to their terms (followed them on Instagram), they would hand me My Wonderful Shirt. And I would be on my way to have the best day of my life.

When I got there, it was 10 am and the booth was roped off. I could see The Shirt, inside the roped off area, but nothing was happening. I did not expect this rope to be here and stared at it, not knowing what it was doing. Why was this rope here?

With a doofy grin on my face, I aproached one of the women working the booth.

“Excuse me,” I said. She looked up at me. I pointed at the roped off area, my grin becoming startlingly larger in anticipation, and asked, “Can I go in there?”

She looked at me like I just landed a spaceship in front of her and asked if I could be the president of the United States as my job.

“Uh, no. The giveaway is at 12:30, then again at 4. There won’t be a line. You just have to show up and line up. And it will be insanity.”

I blinked.

“Okay! Where do I line up at 12:30?”

“No lining up.” She wasn’t even looking at me anymore.

“But you said—”

She had already walked away.

With a cracked-in-half smile, I stood frozen in place watching her go. My eye twitched. What the fuck was going to happen at 12:30?

A completely unnecessary panic began to fill my chest.

Why did she say it was going to be “insanity?” It’s a line, right? You just…get in the line! No insanity! I would just like that shirt, please! Not a big deal, just please give me that fucking shirt so I can take a drag off of it like it’s a cigarette and I’m 25 again and smoke cigarettes. If I could just have that shirt, everything will be okay, for my life. Haha. Thanks so much.

At 12:20 pm, I headed back over to the booth. People had begun lining up. I followed along. After a few minutes, more and more people showed up and crammed themselves into the “line,” which had now taken the shape of a big lumpy amoeba.

This is when the screaming began.

“GUYS WE CAN’T HAVE EVERYONE LINING UP UNTIL 12:30, YOU GOTTA LEAVE,” a security man yelled.

No one moved, because no one could move. We had all assimilated into a gigantic physical mass of human lives at this point, like the thing from The Thing (but huger).

“KEEP MOVING,” another security man shouted. His mouth happened to be immediately next to my head. From then on, the screams were constant.

“KEEP WALKING.” “NOBODY LINE UP.” “THIS IS ALL OF YOUR FAULT. YOU ALL DID THIS.” “WE’RE GONNA SHUT THIS BOOTH DOWN IF YOU GUYS DON’T FOLLOW THE RULES.”

May I just say, I was desperately trying to follow the rules. There was nothing I wanted to do more than fucking follow the goddamn rules. It was now 12:37 pm, everyone was still screaming, “NO LINING UP,” and the panic in my chest had grown like vines all over my body as I stood trapped in the stupid fucking clump of humans all trying to get a free FUCKING shirt. What the hell was I doing? Who cares? Why did I even need this so badly??? I started hyperventilating under my face mask. Suddenly, the screams changed.

“LINE’S CAPPED. EVERYBODY ELSE GET OUT OF HERE.”

What? The line was capped? But there wasn’t a line? Where was the line? Was I in line? Everything looked like a huge amoeba for as far as the eye could see.

I tapped one of the yelling line management people on the shoulder.

“Excuse me,” I gently said. “Am I in line?”

…He got SO mad at me, lmao.

“No, the line is there,” he said, pointing to some guys in a clump directly next to me. Then I guess he thought he needed to shout the rest of his answer to my question to everyone, because three inches from my face, he screamed, “IF YOU’RE NOT TOUCHING THE WALL, YOU’RE NOT IN LINE.”

I stared at the guys next to me in the huge amoeba who were in line and I was not, frozen in place. They were in line. I was not. I was not touching the wall.

“IF YOU’RE NOT BY THE WALL, YOU HAVE TO LEAVE OR WE’RE SHUTTING DOWN THE EVENT.”

This was shouted directly into my head from behind. I had to get out of there. Fuck this. Nothing is worth this! I tried to move and couldn’t. No one was moving! Everyone was shouting!

And do you know what I fucking did? I started crying.

That’s right! Right there on the Comic Con floor, I cried hot tears into my face mask, my heart beating at the speed of sound (like the Coldplay song). It was time for my very own 2024 San Diego Comic Con Exclusive: a lil’ panic attack.

Eventually I squeezed through the amoeba mob and sprinted out of the convention center. I plopped down on the grass, calmed my breathing down, and did the only thing that made sense.

I called my dad crying from Comic Con, lmao. I told him about how mean all the other geeks were and that everyone was yelling at me. He agreed with me that they were mean, which made me feel better. I looked back at the convention center behind me and squinted at it.

My dad thinks you guys are mean too, I thought AT the building, like it could hear me and feel badly.

And as I sat on the ground on the phone, staring at the convention center, I realized that I had planned this trip with a no disappointments guarantee, to myself. I had made a secret promise to myself that this trip to Comic Con would Make Me So Happy. I needed that shirt because I needed to not be disappointed. Not by this. THIS is foolproof. This is comics and movies. That is a FUN part of life! Therefore every moment of it better be perfect or I’m going to fucking lose it!!!

(pointing straight at the sun) It’s summer and I am the fun-having summer woman! You bright PIECE OF SHIT, do my bidding! I am NOT sad today!

A free shirt wasn’t going to alleviate any ongoing grief or change the fact that I’m no longer an 11 year old effectively outrunning a negative feeling by escaping into my favorite fandom of the moment. So, when my dad suggested to his sobbing 37 year old daughter on the phone that she NOT hurt herself trying to get free stuff because everyone is a maniac, I agreed. There was no way I was doing that again. Surely, I had learned my lesson.

…I did do it again, though, but in a way that better aligned with my values: I had a beer down the street beforehand and was too late and missed the time. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Sorry!