The First One Hundred Posts

When Go Play in the Street was initially conceived, the title of this post should have been “The First One Hundred Days”. Good intentions are wonderful things; but as anyone knows who has fumbled helplessly for an excuse that doesn’t exist, good intentions simply don’t get the job done. Begun on November 5, 2004, a Friday, daily posts should have set the hundredth free upon the internet somewhere around February 13, 2005. Even being generous and allowing for the odd weekend and holiday, certainly this point should have been reached by March 1 of that year.

Only three years, five months, and a handful of days behind schedule. Not bad for government work. Unfortunately, this isn’t government work. It is, instead, simply a labor of love.

Quite a bit has happened along the way. Yasser Arafat exited the world stage. Ariel Sharon did as well, though he insists on lingering in the wings – not alive but refusing to succumb to death. Saddam Hussein also left this life, though in his case a bit more assistance was provided to him than the others. Who ever expected to see an execution broadcast to the world via cell phone video? Many other leaders have come and gone, both through the political process and a bit more permanently. Ronald Reagan comes to mind.

In the first meaningful post to this blog I predicted the popular election of Hamas, and warned against defying the will of the Palestinian people simply because it was not the will of Israel and the United States. Fourteen months later, in January of 2006, Hamas did indeed win control of the Palestinian parliament. As predicted, those who demand free and fair elections (so long as the results are the ones desired) were not happy, declared the elections invalid, unacceptable, and generally a bad thing all around. Funding to the region was cut off and the Palestinians physically isolated from the rest of the world to convince them to see things our way. So much for respecting the will of the people and the integrity of the ballot box.

Would that every prediction could be so accurate. Living the life of a lottery winner would no doubt be a pleasure!

I’ve had the opportunity to travel extensively during this time. Many places didn’t live up to their advance billing. Many others, often places I would have never considered going, were far more interesting than I could have ever imagined and I would gladly go back again.

I have reconnected with old friends and made many new ones during these years. I’ve been given a grandchild, and seen a son head off to Iraq. I was also more privileged than some in that I also was able to see him safely home again. To those who have served and returned home I say thank you and welcome home. To those still over there – all the many “over there” locations we are currently involved in – thanks to you as well, and we’ll be waiting for you. To those who went and couldn’t make it back, thanks to you, and to the families you left behind.

It has been said elsewhere that the last shall be first. If you are encountering this blog for the first time today then this last (or at least most recent) post will indeed be the first you encounter. Please go back and enjoy one perspective on politics, human perversity, and general observation from nearly four years in a life.

Much has changed in those four years, and for good or ill all too much has remained the same.