When I was a little boy, I used to think about what it must have been like when the century changed from 1899 to 1900.
I am a real airplane nut, and cognizant of the 1903 flight of the Wright Brothers, and my perspective of the beginning of the 20th century begins
with that flight. I often wondered if the citizens of the world really rode horses, and what they felt like when the electric light and the telephone came,
and how they felt during that exciting time when the century changed.
Now we are in that position and are the people that our kid's children will maybe have similar thoughts about.
Since early 1995, I have been involved with Uriah Heep and the internet. Being one of the webmasters has been a fairy tale come true, believe me.
I have experienced the highest highs, and some pretty low low's. The highs are stunning in my memories, and they shimmer with the same feelings I felt at the time they
occured. There are so many now, I simply smile inside when I think about them, and someday soon, I will get it ALL down on paper so that I can share it with my children, and anyone
else who might like to read about them. They are time-line marks to me...and I am sure you have similar feelings about things like this...you kinda of gage your experiences in the
order they happened, and you remember things in their relative order to each other. This timeline has been the most fulfulling, all encompassing, mentally wrenching situation I have ever
had the extreme pleasure to be involved in.
The lows to me seem very insigificant in the overall scheme of things, but they all have a spot in the memory chain, and I do believe I learned something from each experience.
We all have our lives to lead, outside of Uriah Heep, and the internet, and we all need to keep the importance of what we do here in perspective and in check. This sometimes is difficult, but it's something
we choose to do, and are not forced to do, so we need to be aware of the expression "Beware of what you wish for, you may just get it".
I know for myself, the thing that attracts me are the friends we have become, and the activities we persue due to our involvement. We have learned each of our own likes and dislikes, and we have all become
one with the inherent reason we are here, which is the love of the music, and the respect we pay to Mick, Lee, Bernie, Trevor and Phil for keeping it all going, and affording us, the Heepsters on the Web, the
best of times.
It's with a very sincere heart that I write this page, as many memories are coming back...my 1st e-mails with Hani So and Jesse Lowe, 1st telephone calls, Dave's Den (my 1st website), meeting you one at a time, basically
through e-mails, different trips I have taken to meet and greet fellow Heepsters, the 1st recordings, and the 1st time I realised that there WAS a world out there of people just like me that love to play music, and we figured out
how to record it together, the last time I saw the band, and the 1st time I met them, later phone calls
from all over, and phone calls to all over, the Heepventions, the recordings in St. Louis at Hensley's studio, the cancelled US shows this summer, the
various websites I have done for others on the web, the help from Bob and Graham on "For Love" for my wife Carol, the growing number of Heepsites, as they grew, the 1'000's of e-mails to heep.com, and the 700 people who have signed the guestbook (I really have read each one, and responded to a great many), the "River of Dreams" birthday present from Graham and John Lawton, Rich Wagner and
my wife, and so many other things.
We are a family, as real as any extended family is...we have been through each others fortunes and misfortunes, and we have shared in the good and the bad. We've seen births and deaths, and we've
been there for each other as best as we could be.
Yeah, there are no regrets...I have spent way too much time at this, but you know what? I wouldn't have had it any other way...it's been 5 years now...the people and the experiences will never be forgotten, and the legacy we all will leave behind may certainly seem trivial to others that
can't understand what this all means to us, but it's a legacy I for one am proud of.
I toast you all at this time of the year, and at the end of this century, and I thank you all for your constant support of our efforts to bring Heep into your homes no matter where you live.
I toast my friends and I toast my family, and I thank them for understanding what this all means to me, and to those of you that they have met or spoken to.
In the last few weeks of 1999, I can only simply wish you all the very best, and I wish you all health and happiness as we begin the next year and century.
So my friends....in 90 years, will anyone think about what it was like when WE approached 2000? Maybe...maybe not...but I bet that somewhere out there in whatever world exists at that time, SOMEONE will be carrying the Heep flag high...and someone will still be spreading the word.
I hope that they will be able to enjoy it all just the way we did.
Dave
