Tamzen Marie Baker's farewell message

I've never really believed in goodbyes, so we'll skip that part of the commentary.

I can't think of a single event that has changed my life more than joining the GIA, not even moving to a different state or going 2,000 miles from home for college. GIA is proof to me that when people stand together, anything can be accomplished. I have been with the site since near the beginning, and it has been a simply amazing journey.

The GIA means so much to me in so many ways that I could never recount all of it in just a few paragraphs, and so I'd like to take this time to say thank you instead.

Thank you to the staff - for always working hard, for always remaining true to ourselves, and for accomplishing so much more than I think we all started out envisioning. Thank you for being some of the greatest friends I have ever had, for unknowingly seeing me through many hard times, and for making me laugh on days when the world seemed dark. Thank you for reminding me every day that it's perfectly sane to be 22 years old and as in love with gaming as you were at age 7, and that being a girl gamer is a positive rarity, not a negative one. Thanks go especially to Andrea, for being my fellow Interact editor, for although we knew each other before GIA started, I doubt we would have become as close as we have without it. It will take a lot to me, personally, to top our insane stint as the true "double" agent, and I doubt anyone will ever understand me the way you do. I believe we've been the luckiest of all, to be so involved with our readers, and continue to be into the new site.

To the readership of the GIA - you are the heart and soul of what made this endeavor a success. I thank you for reading, for writing, for emailing. I have made some amazing friends through being involved with fanfics, and I thank each of you for the chance emails that spawned these lifelong friendships - especially Del, for all you did for me last summer, and all you continue to do. I am grateful for the many stories I have been privileged to read over the years, and for all the people whose light sparked my own creativity. You are all the proof that gaming is more than a hobby - it is its own unique artform. Keep writing, keep drawing, keep dreaming - there's still so much to be accomplished, and you are all a part of that.

For every end, there is a new beginning.

The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

~Tamzen Marie Baker