Well, loyal lurkers – and you, over there, stumbling upon this site, wondering where the cool graphics and flashing doodads are – thanks for dropping by (again). Look. I’ve been unfaithful. (There it is.) I haven’t “always been there for you”, wherever “there” is. Mea culpa. I cringe when I note the last date of entry into HowdenTown and, as you can imagine, the public outcry has been furious.

But life changes are sometimes needed, always good for a scribbler, and I surely have bountiful fuel for the writing bus if I can only remember where I left the keys! Here’s the thing: I’m now on a continent where I’ve never been, learning a language I hadn’t imagined needing, obliging myself to draw on spiritual capital I’ve blandly believed was available, and buzzing with anticipation. My bride and I, and our wide-eyed nine-year-old son, have packed up our cozy Canadian townhouse and our cozy professional kits to learn more of what world citizenship involves.

We’re learning. June and July were blurs: wrapping up school and work, dispensing with as many of the trappings of familiarity as we could bear, and seeing what we could find to know and to love in a new way. And here we are in China. CHINA! There will be details.