Saturday, October 24, 2009

Goodbye to Goldendale

It is really strange/moving to be uprooting and relocating.

It's something I have done rather often dating back to my escape from "The South" in 1942 as I had all my worldly goods (except my beloved Lionel electric train) in one big trunk (which got lost by the railroad company) on my way to Boston by way of New York City.

This time is just as adventurous/risky because I will arrive in Madrid on Wednesday with no known place to sleep that night, although I'm pretty sure it will be OK and not require finding room at the inn.

I was just invited to give the welcoming keynote at the Web4All conference next year in Raleigh and all of this is becoming part of that talk. The years since the WWW conference in Santa Clara (WWW6 - 1997) at which the Web Accessibility Initiative was kicked off have been largely flooded with almost magical experiences and the flight to Spain seems a fitting companion to all the relationships I've formed since.

This will likely be the last sermon written in Goldendale and I may never return here but it has been an incredible time during which I learned to be "old".

As I am fond of saying "if I felt any better, they'd put me in jail".

Love.

3 comments:

danbri said...

Glad I got to visit you there! And that you'll be nearer now in Europe. What brings you to Madrid?

Eva Méndez said...

Hey Bill,
Danbri just told me that you are moving to Spain, im-me-dia-te-ly I see for this post. Unfortunately I will be in Argentina this Wed and Charles in Oslo, but please, let's plan to see you (after November, 6th in my case :-(
Hugs and travel safe.

Convivialdingo said...

My word, I can't believe it, it certainly runs in the family I suppose!

I always regretted not making it to Spain - hopefully your time there is bountiful. If you get a chance, visit the Prada Museum - Cita loved that place.