I’m beginning to settle in to the new routine associated with showing up at an office every morning. So far I’ve managed to show up each day dressed and in my right mind.

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I’m having some sort of technical problem with the blog software that is preventing me from placing photos in blog posts or changing the header graphic at the top of the page. Until I figure out what the problem is, we’ll be living in text only world around here.

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I received a wonderful and surprising comment on one of my old blog posts today. Longtime readers will recall my description last May of visiting Holland, Texas and how the tiny central Texas town was founded by one of my ancestors.I also mentioned how my great-grandfather, Samuel Houston Holland, moved from that part of Texas to Oklahoma at some point.

Today I noticed a new comment on that post from a W. A. “Smokey” Hines who, as it turns out, is a distant cousin of mine. He wrote:

I knew Samuel Houston Holland as Uncle Houston and his wife Aunt Ethel. I remember him as a gravely voiced and kind man. He worked in the oil business.

His brother William Thomas Holland was my grandfather.

Tom Holland’s daughter was my mother Ruth.

I enjoyed your writing.

Thank you,
W. A. Hynes

Isn’t the internet great? I assume Mr. Hynes came across my blog post via a Google search. As a result, I got to hear from someone who knew a great-grandfather I never laid eyes on. And to hear about the timber of his voice and learn that he was a kind gentleman is profoundly meaningful to me.

To bed now. Work awaits tomorrow.