Eeek! They're talking about me!

My ears are very red this morning - my curiosity was aroused by a mysterious link on the AA Forum, and... I'm very humbled. (A good feeling as I leave the home office to go do a tricky workplace intervention.)

I really haven't given anything to FT and its members I have not received myself. I lurked and learned, sometimes I saw a question I could actually answer, and it all grew into a feeling of online community. That was familiar, as I was online initially with a local users' group, then helping with volunteer duties moderating on GEnie, later assistant sysop on CompuServe's Travel Forum. Sigh - all of it part of cyberhistory, I'm afraid. But FT continues, and it has the same general feel and helpfulness to others as GEnie and CIS.

Anything that makes us better travelers and brings this global community together is a good thing, IMO. We undoubtedly have different values, ideas, perspectives - but it's always instructive to hear how others see things, to extend ourselves and meet them. It's hackneyed to say travel is broadening, but it is in so many ways; I began when I was a child, sometimes just getting away from home for a day by taking the "Ometochtli" (one rabbit) communal bus to nearby Tepotzlán, observing and soaking up the different language (Nahuatl,) customs, ways of doing things... and it became addicting.

So here I am, an immigrant from Mexico in the armed forces sitting on a tour bus in Japan who met a woman from Connecticut (teaching for the Dept. of Defense,) and all of a sudden it's 40+ years later... and the challenges are the same: making enough time to travel, narrowing down where it will be next (that place I want to return to so I can see / learn more, or someplace new; land-based, or diving - this is my 50th year of scuba diving,) learning more, on occasion having the opportunity to pass it on. It's been a milestone year all around.

Now that I've had the pleasure of meeting a few FTers, once at a mini-do, on occasion in an airport (yeah, those yellow tags do make us more visible.) It'll soon be time to plan attending a full do to meet more of you! Thanks to you all, to Randy for offering this wonderful forum, and here's to personalization, communications, meeting each other halfway and peace.

Cheers, José / JDiver

(I really did not start out to write a plurry speech - just to say "thanks! It's great to be here.")