Editor's Corner

Welcome to the Spring Edition of Aikido East 2007. I hope everyone had a great winter and is enjoying the beautiful spring days. As you can see from the long table of contents, this is a hugely successful edition, and I would like to thank everyone who supports, reads, and contributes to the newsletter. The addition of the new category For, By and About Kids received a very positive response, and I'm thrilled that we have such a variety of entries for its first viewing!

There is another chapter heading for this newsletter that I would like to introduce in the next edition. It will be called Time Frames. There are so many old, archival photographs depicting the history of the USAF - its people, seminars, instructors, dojo - that would be wonderful to make available for everyone to see. Time Frames will be a place to preserve our pictorial past, as well as displaying old articles and interviews with our shihan and shidoin. So, I hope you dig through your drawers and submit some of the treasures that have been tucked away for years. Please send all work in a digital format - either by email or on a cd.

Here is some very important news concerning this newsletter. Effective January 1, 2008, Aikido East will have a new name. The USAF has undergone several changes in the recent past, and this community resource should reflect the new, unified organization and its visions for the future, its dojo and individual members. The newsletter will become the USAF Aikido Newsletter, and it may have a new look to celebrate its new beginning. We will keep you informed as we approach the new year.

I would also like to thank the Chief Instructors who helped to make the annual renewal process for 2007 so efficient. We have had more dojo and individual members register early in a calendar year than ever before.

As you can see, there are many exciting changes and signs of growth within the USAF and they are reflected in this newsletter. The next edition will be online September 15th 2007, so take notes, take pictures and stay in touch!

Laura Jacobs Pavlick, Editor