Hello folks,
This letter has been a long time in coming, and in my heart,
long overdue.
In case you are not familiar with my name, I was the one who
started the original veg-raw mailing list back in 1995, only
to disappear out of site after months of maintaining the list.
The reasons behind my sudden departure are numerous, and I will
spare the details for the most part, but it essentially boiled
down to this: after 11 years of working for a company that I
was part owner, it became clear that we were all but successful
financially (good product, insufficient marketing), and I was
forced to make a major changes in my way of living. My financial
crisis affected the operation of the list in a major way when
my computer equipment died, and I could not fix it at the time.
Although the ISP graciously did not delete my account after months
of inability to pay, I had only very limited occasions where I
could get to my account (using a friend's computer), so the list
suffered for a period of time. I felt overwhelmed with my inability
at the time to fix the situation myself, so, I regretfully
withdrew, instead of working with others to resolve the difficulties
and get the list back on firm grounding.
I am not offering the above as an excuse; there is no excuse for
leaving the list in the way that I did, for letting others down,
and I'm sure I will never accept my resigning from the list, and
from society in other aspects in the manner that occurred at this
point in my life.
Fortunately for the raw community, there were some great people
who worked diligently to resurrect the list, and set the basis
for what we are enjoying today. In particular, I am very grateful
to the efforts of Michael Clingman for getting the list back
operational, and for Thomas Billings, for his extensive and
generous support he provided, which dated back to the very incarnation
of the list. I would like to humbly but genuinely express my thanks
to the individuals who stepped forward and kept the list going
at this juncture, along with my sincere apologies to everyone
affected by my departure.
When I look at the list and where it has come to today, I can
see that the raw community has benefited greatly from its
existence, even through the rough waters with zealotry
and spitefulness that have occurred at times. We have a lot
to thank David Karas and Peter Brandt for the quality of the
list as it exists today. We are blessed to have moderators
who have exhibited dedication to honesty and higher principles,
and who have worked willingly and tirelessly to provide an
environment where high quality content has become the norm.
Finally, I am most grateful to all who have contributed to the
list over the years, providing the interesting discussions that
have occurred. I know that I have benefited greatly, even at the
distance I have maintained. When I first started the list, I
called it veg-raw - I did not know of or either consider eating
RAF. Never heard of exotic items such as durians or cassia, or of
other paradigms such as the practice of Instinctive Eating. I
am very glad that the name of the list changed to what it is today,
open to any intellectual discussion on all aspects of raw eating.
I have been been enlightened in more ways than I could hope to
count.
At this point, I have resolved myself to try to get beyond my
previous difficulties in life, and attempt once again to make
whatever humble contributions I can from my eternal pool of
indebtness to the raw community. It is certainly late in the game
and well overdue, but I feel that I now must and am prepared to make
the effort if the raw community can find a way to accept it.
This has gotten long enough now, so in humble gratitude to everyone,
thanks for reading this.
David Mayne
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