President Kimberly Weaver presented Mr. Kirk Driskell, District Governor of Rotary District 6900, as our speaker. Kirk spent most of his fascinating talk describing how he could easily be the most unlikely person to be heading one of the most renowned districts in all of Rotary International. Kirk said he was an alcoholic and felon and described a fateful moment on April 25, 1995, where he was trying to locate an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. Instead he walked into an Alpharetta Decision and Review Board meeting. The person leading the meeting saw Kirk as a person in dire straits. Because he was an active Rotarian, he was aware of service groups in the community, and he knew right away Kirk needed help and eventually directed him to the AA meeting which was being held in another part of the building. He also mentioned another life changer where someone had arranged for a short meeting with Ambassador Andrew Young … 15 minutes that turned into Young spending 2 ½ hours with Kirk … just two of many experiences Kirk describes as “God showing up anonymously” to change his life. These and other situations, including Kirk getting into Rotary, led to his whole life being set up to serve others, which is what he and Rotary are all about. He said God gives you everything you need on the condition that you give everything away. He said we advocate and care with compassion, giving to help another figure out her/his WHY in life, but in the end benefit ourselves as the givers. For this year as District Governor and last year in preparation for his DG  job, he credits his wife Deena Driscoll as the one making it happen. Deena with Kirk went to a Rotary work site for improving housing for people who do not have the barest minimum of a place to live. She was overcome and transformed by the unfairness and knew she had to give more, including supporting her husband in the DG job. So these are parts of the story of how Kirk, a “drugged-out felon” in April 1995, is now, 25 years later, visiting more than 70 Rotary Clubs to explain and urge how important it is for each of us to enter into Service Above Self. Kirk described the District Governor Retreat with Rotary International President Holger Knaack who added to the normal goal of recruiting more members by emphasizing retaining and engaging our existing members. The reason: Holger said we start the year with about 1.2M members worldwide, take in lots of new members but by the end of the year, we lose as many as we took in. So by investing in each of us, we retain members which increases our membership and our impact. Kirk came across as a true humanitarian. He said apart from our job in Rotary, we all need to be caring people. One way to do that is each week think of five persons we know, but who we’ve not talked with in a long time. Kirk said on each Monday through Friday we need to call one of these people – with no agenda. He said we are in demand to be in community and not to be isolated. For Rotary we must innovate and it will be a blessing to us callers, even promising it to be life-changing. Reporting on the 2020 Rotary International Convention, there was much pressure to cancel as almost every other organization had been doing. A call went to all district governors worldwide with all continents represented on the call. RI, nevertheless, chose a virtual convention with tremendous attendance and results. The message is to protect our health and to be determined to wherever possible not let COVID-19 hold us back … or use COVID-19 as an excuse not to do what we could – safely. On PolioPlus Kirk explained that giving to The Rotary Foundation is down, so he urged all of us to give. He noted that we know the Polio vaccine works and we need to wipe out this disease, unlike COVID-19 for which we do not have a vaccine. So Kirk says to give to what we know works. Kirk concluded by mentioning his company called Vision Warriors – serving felons or people in long-term recovery, whom he’s urging not to let their pasts define their futures. Mark Newman spoke for AWER Members by saying Kirk gave us the most unusual and best District Governor presentation in memory.