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Random Inspiration

The Child
Some days, I just have to keep my ears open for inspiration. Having the day off today, I was able to take J and her friend A to the museum to check out a couple of art installations I had read about in the local newspaper. A is a very polite child but it is impossible to get a reaction other than "I don't know" when asked for an opinion. So, I had know idea if she enjoyed the outing, if the galleries we went to were the ones she was interested in or if the lunch we ate at the cafe was what she really wanted. 
So imagine my astonishment when we sat down in the lobby on some Neinkamper chairs and A said "In my dream house, I must have these chairs - I simply love them". The passion  in her voice touched something deep inside me - for a ten year old to have a dream home and imagine what it might look like is not entirely unexpected but coming from someone who almost always says " I don't know", it was very special. Beneath the gentle and unassuming surface, I imagine there is a lot of steel and resolve - A might be one of those who tend to their dreams diligently in solitude until they came to fruition. From being frustrated with her at not helping with any decision around their day, I went to having respect for her.
The Adult
DB is given to mulling over things for a while before he is able to fully articulate what he is thinking. Inevitably, the insights come when you least expect it. Today, while running a technical issue at work by me, he segued into our relationship and had this to say about what ails us. "The change I am asking of you is a change in the pattern of thinking about things. What you are doing instead, is reacting to each instance I am upset about and correcting that one thing when tens of other issues similar to it remain unchanged. That is frustrating and tiring both of us - I see no hope and you see no end to the criticisms. You need to change the algorithm and not the data sets - that way your reaction will follow the same pattern in all instances and you won't have to solve each instance as its own problem" We have had a million variants of this discussion from the time we got married. However, this is the first time, I felt like we were close to a solution.
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Comments

Anonymous said…
"You need to change the algorithm and not the data sets"

Super. Thanks.
12:44 AM
Priyamvada_K said…
I liked the same statement that Anon above liked - algorithm versus data sets :)

Priya.
9:54 AM
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