A Word from the President

At the start of the year 2012, it is traditional to offer wishes for a happy new year to the members of one's family and friends. For a family association such as ours, where one of the goals is to develop family ties that unite us, it is very pleasant for me to wish all of you, dear members, a year of joys and family reunions, of spiritual and physical well-being, of prosperity that will protect you during this period of turbulence around the world, of wisdom in all the decisions that you will have to make.

Socrates, in the fourth century BC, said, "Take time to get to know you. Know you, yourself." Why? Because we have to know our qualities, our talents, and our weaknesses. For some time, the Association has looked back overt he accomplishments and the possibilities for our Association. Our group is in good shape compared to other, similar organizations. But our aging membership has stabilized at 200 members and nothing indicates a significant increase.

What to do? First of all we need to have projects of interest to younger generations: the Y's, the X's, and above all the baby boomers who are leaving the workforce and who have the time and talent to get involved. The future lies in instant communication. We must therefore put together a team that has expertise in this area related to the Intenet.

We are now working with iweb, a successful new web-hosting service that offers an enormous number of free services. We also have a competent webmaster. It remains for us to select software that corresponds to our needs and to implement the services available progressively.

During an interview with the Business Journal, Eric Chouinard, the founder of iweb was asked what it was that inspired him to become so passionate about his work. He replied, "Dreaming! Every step in the development if iweb started with the phrase, 'Wouldn't it be fun if …' I then got good people together to make the dream a reality,"

I have set myself to dreaming. It would be fun if … we put in place a system that made if possible for all the Robitailles to communicate with one another. It would be fun if … we could publish all the stories of our parents and grandparents. It would be fun if … etc.

That's what we want to do in the next six months.

69