Launched
Almost two months ago, I sat down with a good friend to create and produce a halfway decent website. A goal I set for myself almost a decade ago. When we finished and I purchased the necessary domain name I was chagrined to find that there was a necessary legal limbo waiting time (sigh). That time is up and the JohnPoniske.com site has been launched. Hallelujah! Doesn’t look too shabby if I don’t say so myself. However, I am ever open to comments and suggestions.
It is currently late Spring and my garden is in. I am an avid vegetable gardener. My father was before me as was my grandfather. One of my earliest memories is helping my father plant corn. He poked a hole in the ground and told me to drop in a seed and I filled the whole hole up with seed. What can I say, I am an overachiever. Seeing green growing things, nurturing them and reaping their harvest is sacred to me. It is renewing and fulfilling.
These last couple weeks I spent precious time with my son and my daughter using power tools and painting. It is special spending time with my children now that they are grown. I see so many others complain about their estranged relationships and I marvel at how well our children turned out. I am more than proud of them. I am jealous, jealous of their knowledge and their experience. That they so eagerly involve us in their affairs surprises and pleases us. Jenny and think of them not so much as offspring as best friends.
Jen and I also took a trip to Philadelphia where we met with our good friend Jim Callahan, who always takes us on amazing adventures. This time around we visited a nautical museum which included the last surviving battleship of the Spanish-American War - the USS Olympia (Commodore Dewey’s flagship). What a hoot it was to walk its century old decks, to visit with its historian reenactors and to visit the Captain and Commodore’s staterooms complete with artillery batteries !!! Of course we visited three local breweries while we were at it. Oh my life is OH SOOOO GOOD!
This past month my latest game PLAINS INDIAN WARS was published. It is a slick production by GMT Games which produces some of the finest game components on the market. I have great faith in its success and so far it is not letting me down. At the same time I am polishing another Native American War game called PONTIAC’S WAR. It is much more involved: siege rules, captives, war loans tribal coalitions and so much more. It is an ambitious project. I have my fingers crossed.
Closing in on finishing book VIII Political Quadrille. Currently involved in research on Lincoln’s administration in 1864 as the war is winds down. I am champing at the bit to dive into Reconstruction. Next book will be the close of the war and although I will be sad to leave this period behind, there is always more to learn around the corner …. and isn’t that was life is all about, turning the corner?