The year was 2014. I had the flu... not COVID of Swine, or avian. The common, everyday flu. I’m sitting in my chair, wrapped in a blanket with a 102 fever, watching YouTube. A channel launched earlier that year that unfolded World War One history in week-sized bites. I binge watched that “last summer” all the way to December. It was great. I kept watching for the next four years. I mean, I’m a fan of World War One history. I learned a lot. It led to a larger channel called Time Ghost History. Great channel. Check it out. It is now 2025. We are now 250 years from the early days of the American Revolution. The “Shot heard ‘round the world” was fired on 19 April 1775. The beginning of what would be a second global war--the French & Indian/Seven Years War was the first---was a quarter of a millennium ago. World War One rocked Western society. It set the stage for a hundred years of turmoil. World War Two-The Reckoning, the Cold War, the Space Race. All of that is because of a four year fight. But the American Revolution is a bigger deal. It launched two-hundred years of revolution in Western thinking. It birthed the first modern republic. The French Revolution was a direct consequence. The aristocrat counter-revolutionary movements of Communism and Socialism) emerged. Anarchists, who contributed to lighting off the First World War, flowed from that. Where is Time Ghost? They are focused on the Greek Civil War and events that happened after WW2. Yes, definitely an important era. But not earth shattering. Nobody is talking about the most important eight years of American History. Nobody...

I started 2025 with high hopes of grand accomplishments. I had the focus words "Focus, Complete, Elevate," and goals to complete throughout the year. I was going to follow cycles ala 37 Signals. But no sooner did I pen those words than things changed. I was asked to write a conference application for a large conference of my peers, which I started on 8 January. More importantly, in February I was given a chance to retire early from my federal service. With a small break in the mid-2000s, I've served the US government in one fashion or another since I was 20. I thought I had a few years to go when voluntary early retirement was offered. It was part of the infamous "fork in the road" email. As Yogi Berra said, "if you find a fork in the road, take it." So I did. From 19 February to today, three months, I've been in aggressive transition. We moved the family from Virginia to North Carolina in April. We closed on selling our house just recently. I had my retirement ceremony. My "real job" is no longer a distraction. This is the first Monday after all of that. I've started the process of incorporating Merovex Press in North Carolina. I'm laying the foundation to make this blog application a shared application with other writers and authors. And I'm conspiring to returning to writing as soon as I finish the conference application and taking this application wide. Thank you for continuing on the journey with me.