mr. leland melvin. thank you. [applause] >> thank you very much. wow. this is my first book signing and i'm blown away for my friends and family and colleagues and all the people who are here. i've always thought about maybe writing a book one day but i didn't really know the process or the things that really happen in this process. in 2001 my parents had a 35th wedding anniversary in virginia. i was sitting in the car with my cousin phyllis and a friend of hers named jenness torres. this is all in the book, if you read the book. this is kind of where my life changed in a really dramatic way. phyllis was a cousin from north carolina. her friend was this person who had a message for me and i didn't know her. i just met her. she said something is going to happen to you. no one is going to know why this happened. you will be healed of this thing and then you will fly in space and share the story with the world. i'm like, okay, thank you for that information. i will take that under advisement. i had just come back from russia. i was in russia for two years