Learning Scratch

I discovered Scratch when J was in elementary school and got her started on it - to play and make things with. In her case the curiosity and fascination was rather short-lived - started strong but the drop off came just as quickly. She's one of those that never took a real interest in coding - it reminds me of me in some ways. I atleast tried, had a mix of success and failures before deciding this was not for me. J came to the conclusion without taking any of those intermediate steps - a sign of the time perhaps where gratification and feedback come about very fast. The reasons that the author cites why Scratch may continue to grow in popularity make sense:

 ..browsing projects shows you what’s possible. A kid begins by playing games, starts to get curious, and next thing you know, they’re changing the code to give themselves extra lives.

It believed this to be true myself but did not see J take that leap from the early stages of familiarity, curiosity and game-playing to wondering what else might be possible with Sratch and programming in general. I always struggled with understanding why some kids are able to cross that chasm and get to the other side where coding can do real things whereas others simply don't see that bridge. J was curious and eager to learn about an assortment of things and could dive deep when she wanted - this subject was just not in that category. 

Free Ticket

Saw this story recently and could not help thinking that I would not score one of those free tickets - but it would be a great to see more small public service give-aways like this one. If not a free ticket atleast a small discount or even reward points for effort. Same idea like Sweatcoin except it could be less intrusive. Little incentives like this one to make people get a bit more fit adds up when calculated across the population. 

Fitness always pays off and the Indian Railways, under its initiative to promote the culture of fitness among the people, wants you to save your hard earned money. As little as only thirty squats can get you a free platform ticket at the Anand Vihar railway station in the national capital now as part of the railways' Fit India initiative.

In a first-of-its-kind scheme, the Indian Railways has installed a squat machine at the Anand Vihar station and 30 squats in 180 seconds in front of the machine will generate a free platform ticket.

I can't see a lot of women availing this in Delhi but the idea is still meritorious. Would be interesting to see if anyone who would physically struggle to get to the finish line would bother to try or this would just be a fun thing for reasonably fit people to do. No reason why the experience cannot be gamified to create the right incentives for folks to push themselves out of their comfort zone. 

Work Life

All around me I am seeing the push and pull about returning to the office. In many situations no one is insisting that you do but rather leading by example that you are not beholden to follow. The argument that working from home can be more efficient and productive does not hold much water as this author points out. Everyone understands the costs and inconvenience of needless travel back and forth but the powers that be don't care so much about the drop in productivity. To me it always seemed like an issue of control - see the person face to face for a fixed period of time everyday, focused on Office business no back and forth dance between Work and Life. Without such control, the worker's proclivities become difficult if not impossible to fathom. 

Back in the day when I went to a physical office every day, I was always able to see the signs of a person on their way out months before they actually resigned. Sometimes multiple people demonstrated those signs and it was clear to me that I need to be on the market as well. Learning these signals proved advantageous to me and I am sure I was not the only one able to read them. 

Now in a remote setting there are no signals to see or read - atleast not as clearly. The departures provoke much more surprise.  The one job that fundamentally changed the course of my life came about at the literal water cooler where I was telling someone my contract would be up in a month and I did not have the best options lined up yet. A guy who had overheard the conversation told me about the job he could not take because it would require relocation but could be a great option for me. He connected me to the recruiter later that day and the rest is history. 

People will have different benefit statements for coming to a physical place of work everyday. It varies by stage of life and career, temperament and aspirations. For some of there are very few benefits based on where we are. 

Life Lessons

Watched The House of Gucci recently. The story is made for the movies and a testament to truth being stranger than fiction. Everyone in the cast seemed to try a little too hard to act Italian and somehow missed the mark. De Sica movies get the ambience exactly right without going overboard (from the perspective of someone foreign to the culture). In that regard expectations from the movie fell short. 

It is the kind of difference I would experience as a desi watching Slumdog Millionaire as opposed to the nuanced works of Nihalini or Benegal They all speak to the Indian condition but the manner in which that story is told makes all the difference. A lot of local folks have asked me over the years about Indian movies and I have done my best to steer them in the direction of the masters and often successfully. 

Those gripes apart, it was an interesting movie just on the weight of the plotline. Any story that commands attention as this one certainly does, it leaves the viewer wondering what they could take away from it that maps to their world very far apart from what is playing out on the screen. 

For me, it was about levers a woman chooses to use in her marriage, the unintended consequences of gaining power in this way and the ultimate tragedy that comes from all of that. There is a certain rush that comes from seizing power in a relationship that gives the person a false sense of comfort and security in their situation - it can get to the point of  unshakable and unbreakable. 

When that blind faith is shattered they spin out of control. More often than not, the partner has has succumbed is internally restless and seeking air to breathe. Maurizio was that person here and he made his choices that lead to his death. Ordinary people make very similar choices and they pay dearly too - even if not with their life. 

Being Perceptive

The idea of being in a state of controlled hallucination makes you wonder what that means for the art of the possible. We take in the same scene but the highlight reel looks different for each one of us. Say a group of friends as sitting on the beach, each person would focus on what matters to them - the setting sun among the clouds, the rhythm of the waves, the birds flying around, the children splashing in the water, building sand castle and so on. Depending on where the person's center of attention is, the scene would look quite different. So when one person points out the a dolphin sighting only a few others are able to tune in to see the fleeting vision. The rest miss it. This is not about hallucination but more about perspective. When aggregated over a life time, perhaps we develop our own versions of the world, our truths and lies about it. 

“Experiences of free will are perceptions. The flow of time is a perception.” 

These lines from the article are very relatable. I have yet to experience the exercise of free will in my life. I imagine others may have more agency but perhaps they don't and it is only perception. The flow of time on a day without anything planned while on vacation in an unknown city has an incredibly slowing effect on time. I recall this time recently when I decided to walk from my Airbnb to a restaurant at the other end of town so I could explore my surroundings. The others were to meet me at 7 pm and I was going to arrive at the location with a good 30 minutes to spare. The manner in which to spend that extra time made me think about the detours I could take and the minutes that would dissipate of my total of 30. At one point I sat on a park bench having found nothing else of interest and just stared ahead for five minutes. On a workday, this would be an unthinkable luxury so I made the most of it.

Touched Out

I was forced to live apart from J for over a year when she was a baby. That experience stands out in my life for how dark and depressing it was. To this day, I wish the clock would turn back and I would have those precious months I missed with her - this time in a way a mother in a normal family situation might have it, the way I imagined my early motherhood would be. 

What I would give for memories of more touch from my baby who is now a grown woman living her own independent life. When I read this article I was not able to relate at all - it fades away in a flash, that time when you are your baby's center of the universe and their comfort object.

“The fact of the matter is that not many mothers are prepared for the developmental—both the physical and psychological—changes during the transition to motherhood. The touched body, the degree and frequency it is touched—how much and how often—is not even imagined as a potential stressor until it happens or reaches a crisis,” 

Never thought about the touch of a baby in this way. There is something warm and healing about the touch of a child - your own or another's. I never got enough of it but I can imagine it is possible for a woman with multiple young child vying for her attention non-stop can feel exhausted from doling out bits of her self all day long. 

Power Attire

Indian businesswoman Barbie seems like a hit based on the reviews. Would be great to see it taken a step further, the power suit traded for a beautiful saree. A lot of powerful Indian women have worn sarees and looked like perfection in them - grace and power come together. I would love to see that look on a Barbie - the saree become acceptable as business attire for an Indian woman no matter what part of the world business takes her. I have had a lot of male and female coworkers encourage me over the years to break glass and wear a saree to a business meeting - set the standard. If only I was that bold. 

While I have appreciated the sentiment and the show of support, I have not been able to travel the distance. Wearing Indo-western clothing is as far as I have made it and chances are I have reached my limits - its where the sweet spot lies for me. Being comfortable in my own skin, expressing my cultural identity and still being able to blend in with the larger crowd. That said, I dream of the day when it would be completely normalized for Indian women to come to client meeting in a saree no different than if they were in a power suit. If Barbie can be the harbinger of such change, I am all in favor. 

Being Present

In the last couple of decades there has been a lot of talk about following the digital exhaust of consumer behavior to better learn their needs and wants. Better yet, be ready to fulfill those in anticipation. Yet, the simplicity of this idea to meet the customer where they are shows empathy, creativity and commonsense. 

..the United States was engaged in World War II. Americans who were not on the frontlines made sacrifices so the soldiers could have provisions. All available cotton and wool was diverted to the war effort. Desperate for fabric for clothing, homemakers crafted clothes out of the cotton sacks. The flour sack dress became a common, and trendy, outfit. Everywhere you looked there were flour sack dresses. There were even sewing competitions where women would go head-to-head and show off their sewing skills.

These dresses were a way for rural women to show off their fashion sense all while being frugal. Flour sack dresses were all the rage up until around the 1960s. Today, we remember the style of these iconic dresses and the historical legacy that they leave!.

It is great lesson for modern marketers to learn - how do you make yourself relevant, memorable and useful to your customer while promoting the cause of your business. No third party cookies needed.

Perceived Value

Missed this piece of news while being inundated by stuff all around - at home and work. Customer data tracking is butting up against a raft of regulations these days and as I customer I am very much in favor of not being tracked.  The advice for businesses  is simple ".. start working on finding other ways to track consumer data in a way that is safe and follows privacy laws". In real terms that means establishing an upfront "contract" with the customer you want to track. Show them a sliding scale of value in return of information collected. No data collection no value, highest data collection, highest value. 

Let the consumer decide where there appetite for giving up privacy fits and what price they are willing to pay for the value. I personally found the in-home Covid tests fairly intrusive in terms of data being collected while not doing enough to understand the patient's infection and recovery in the context of their profile, medical and travel history. It felt like blunt instrument for the purpose it was meant to serve. But when viewed through the lens of value to consumer, an airlines partnership starts to make a lot more sense. A customer may be far more willing in this case because the value is evident. 

Groom Kidnapping

Watched Antardwand and it was a sad experience. Having spent a good part of my growing up years in what is now Jharkhand, the cast of characters felt realistic and that compounds the miserable after-taste from the movie. This is not meant to be entertainment and no one wins. The treatment and social status of women is a big part of the problem but the emasculation of sons by the patriarch is the other. They have no power to do what is right even when they are well-intentioned. The system is designed for submission to the will of the highest ranking male. Everyone's fate hinges on that man's ability to be human. In this movie we see two that simply cannot summon themselves and wreak havoc on the lives of many. 

They make bad decisions without remorse or consequence, willing do anything to prevail - have their word be the final one. Looking at this bizarre way of life now far removed from it in time and distance, I had to wonder if all this was not the result of cripplingly low esteem driving these men towards insanity, an expression of complete impotence at the physical and spiritual level. 

No man who has something worthwhile to offer to his family and the world, will resort to such level of brutishness and certainly not need to abuse every woman in his sphere of influence to feel he is in charge. Coming out of that world, it is hard for a woman to expect normalcy and fairness in how she is treated by a man, her expectations in marriage - she is primed for abuse and will often look for an abuser in intimate partnership because that is the only type of relationship she knows. Yet the "world" that is India is very far from homogenous. This story is one of the millions playing out everyday - movies have been made about those other stories as well, about men who go way above and beyond the call of duty to support the women in their lives.  

Losing Smell

I had Covid a few weeks ago and travel a long way back home after that. By now this is so common and routine that it goes without remark or attention. When I tested positive, my thoughts turned to people close to me that died of the same thing - just a year or so ago. It was not quite as mundane back then. It was sobering to consider how much timing mattered in life.

 Loss of smell and taste to the point of nothingness was deeply unsettling for me until once again I recalled the deaths of loved ones. I also recalled my former co-worker M who was got Covid in the early days and has yet to recover her sense of smell. That is well over two years now and she has learned to make peace and live with a handicap. I was close to losing my mind in days. 

After things turned to normal, I am trying harder than ever to be grateful for all that went well for me - not being forced to put myself in harm's way, having the ability to work from home, being able to recover without much difficulty, being able to smell once again, being alive. I also realized how integral smell is to quality of life. 

The world turns inanimate and unresponsive without this dimension. For those few days when I did not have any sense of smell, I would try to re-construct the smell of my favorite perfume on my wrist. The brain seemed to have a way to get me very close to the finish line through memory and imagination but it was always a bit short. 

Watching Ozark

Finally finished watching Ozark, it had been on our list for the longest time but four seasons felt like a big commitment. Much has been written about the show and everyone has their own perspective. To me it was a story about putting family first. The operating definition of family must of course adapt because only so many people can be put "first". The fringes of the family unit will not experience the protections afforded by the "family first" doctrine. And so it happens that a ex-husband can get roughed up so he is more able to fall in line, a couple of uncles are electrocuted and a brother is left to be disposed off by a hit-man. There are many such family units in the show and they all follow the same guiding principles for the most part - do what is right for the family and the rest does not matter. 

Right is always relative and mileages vary a great deal. These stories and sub-plots unfold in view of modern society that is deeply cynical. There are no consequences for bad deeds if the person doing them is rich, powerful or well-connected - sometimes they may be all of that. And finally, we see the slow hardening of an average suburban family into a life of complete criminality. For some reason this show holds and universal appeal. I can't recount how many people have recommended it to me over time and how different they are from each other. Like them I enjoyed it too.

Odd Armor

I had a female boss who wore her vulnerability like a suit or armor. When people first encountered her they saw that as different and bold for a woman. Men and women agreed that F was not a weakling just because she dared to project vulnerability- she could fight like the best of them and win. Not everyone felt comfortable with her over-sharing but they grudgingly respected that she could without feeling in the least awkward.

Sadly that winning streak came to and end recently. Her reporting structure changed and her new manager who came from outside the company (an uncommon move at that level for this organization), had earned the reputation of being petulant and temperamental like a child in his prior roles. When I heard about F's new boss through the grapevine, I knew this relationship would be fraught. 

F and this new guy needless to say did not hit it off and in a few months she was gone. It was interesting to observe how the consensus opinion of F's controversial management and interaction style shifted with this turn of events. If F had found inspiration and support for her leadership style in stories like this, it sounded like her colleagues did not see the point anymore - it was to them a risk not worth taking. F's rise and fall had been the needed proof-point, 

Reading Zone

I would be more a "periodical" reader than a book reader these days but good to know that every little bit of reading helps. When traveling, I am always curious about books people are are reading in planes, trains and buses. A high schooler on her way to a state level sports competition was seated next to me recently. It was heartwarming to see her reading a physical book for the entirety of the five hour flight, no distractions by phone or wifi (even though it was freely available). She was in a zone with the copy of young adult fiction and close to the end of the book by the time we deplaned. 

I had been that person when I was her age but the ability to successfully immerse in fiction faded over the years until I its all but impossible now. It probably has to do with lack of uninterrupted time in daily life - getting into the zone used to take me several hours and that was part of the joy of reading fiction. Easier access to movies that tell the story in a shorter period of time was a contributor too. Over time the fiction reading muscle degraded but I imagine there is still something out there for me that could start to build it back along with all the benefits that come with it. 

Automated Out

A robotic replacement of a pizzeria is a sign of the times I suppose. Food service workers have been underpaid and overworked for the longest time. For a bit, wages crept up due to labor shortage but it also prompted automation. There is a sweet spot for cost vs quality of human rendered service compared to automation. If this becomes the fate of pizzerias and more, it would mean the balance has titled in favor of robots. If the quality of the finished product is on-par with the human made equivalent, then for many it will make no difference that a robot made it. 

This is specially true if the quality of service provided by the human staff was nothing to write home about. The customers would trade the hassle-free interaction over the dubious benefits of humans processing their pizza order. I can think of a dozen establishments where the customer may have a better experience without disgruntled staff serving them. It is unfair to the workers in the the short run but one would hope this will prompt upskilling and the labor force moving in a direction that offers better compensation and benefits than working at a pizzeria did.

Domestic Assist

A robot that could take over household chores could be great for the elderly who want to live independently but are not quite able to take on all the work that comes with it. My parents are able to take care of themselves so far and have not had any domestic help for a couple of decades. It was an unusual choice in their social milieu back then and they are still in the minority. They have managed by dividing tasks between themselves and acquiring a few appliances. To them that beats hiring help and dealing with everything that comes with it.

I asked them about their opinion of this story on Salon about the plight of domestic workers in India. Their position is that while those stories in the report are likely accurate, things can look very different for the elderly and vulnerable. They could be at the mercy of the domestic worker and can be abused in many ways. The fact that being a domestic worker can be the only source of livelihood for so many people is a problem that has yet to be solved. The poverty trap it creates is once that is hard to escape - only a small minority manage to do that. 

Feeling Disoriented

I met the group of people I work with after a year of having been part of the team. The first day was awkward, the second was better and the last day was a relief - both to have had this chance to see people in person and to also have it over with. It was with very mixed emotions that I left my intense foray into "normal". The a different sort of reality was shaped in the last couple of years where the person slides into the virtual behind a screen showing up only sometimes on camera. The intensity of the in-person interaction could be a little much to recoil from and return to the quiet, secluded zone. I was very glad to have performed my obligations and being able to head on the flight back home. I might not be alone in the sense of disorientation in the wake of an event like this one which used to be very routine back in the day.

According to the American Psychological Association (APA), 79% of employees had experienced work-related stress in the month before the survey, which was done in 2021. Nearly three in five employees reported negative impacts of work-related stress, including lack of interest, motivation, or energy (26%) and lack of effort at work (19%). Meanwhile, 36% reported cognitive weariness, 32% reported emotional exhaustion, and an astounding 44% reported physical fatigue — a 38% increase since 2019, the report said.

Although burnout isn't a medical diagnosis, according to the Mayo Clinic, it can affect your physical and mental health. The World Health Organization declared burnout an official occupational phenomenon in 2019

Draining Water

A  few days ago, we woke up to a loud thunderstorm with huge lightning flashes. Majestic and scary sight with a dark and brooding sky to match. At some point we realized that the basement might get flooded given the vigor of the downpour. It was already late by then and we spend the next couple of hours to contain the water. Then just as suddenly as it had started, the rain was gone and the sun came out shining bright. If we had not been at home or if the flash flood had lasted much longer, we would have had a big problem on our hands. This is a well known problem but the solutions are not quite smart and connected as one would hope. Any number of water leak detectors exist in the market and there are a variety of pumps that can take care of a flooded basement but as with many problems in the world, you have access to the pieces of the puzzle but have to work out your own solution. 

The event brought to mind Mrs. T with whom had lived as a house guest for a few months decades ago. During my stay, there had been a flash flood and her basement was flooded. Recently widowed at the time, Mrs. T started by feeling overwhelmed - she was very capable of taking care of things around the house including minor repairs but in the midst a bigger more sudden event she clearly missed having Mr. T around. I was too green to be any use to her so she proceeded on her own.

I recall her being gone into the basement for the rest of the day, trying to drain out the water. She'd come back out periodically, talk about progress made or not made. Getting hold of her son proved problematic that day even though he lived only one county over. The next morning, it was a gorgeous summer day, her son's fancy convertible was parked in the driveway. Mom had made him his favorite tuna salad sandwich which I found him eating in the kitchen. 

We talked about the flooded basement, he dispensed some wisdom that was far too removed from my life and experience at the time to mean anything. Mrs. T seemed to find value in whatever he had to say. He had checked out the basement and deemed all was well there. He left after a while and we carried on with the rest of our day. It was still the weekend and in other circumstances we may have taken a walk or run errands but Mrs. T was physically and emotionally drained from the previous day.

I remember thinking how differently that weekend might have been for all concerned if Mr. T had been alive. For one thing, I would not have been present to witness her distress - she had started to rent out her spare bedroom because she was really disliked staying alone. That weekend, despite my presence and her son coming by, Mrs. T was truly alone and it was plainly evident that it hit her hard. 

Musical Fail

Good article on the gradual "demise" of classical music. Many reasons could be cited for this but the author argues the main reason is : 

.. the near-total inability of post-World War II America and Europe to produce more than a small number of classical works that any normal person would want to hear. That failure is slowly killing classical music. You can’t expect the public to remain engaged with works of the distant past if the present doesn’t produce anything interesting. Today’s concertgoers are not antiquaries; they, too, no less than music lovers in centuries gone by, want to enjoy and rave about the latest thing. 

Maybe people who love classical music don't appreciate modernism. Its "classical" or a reason. If new music is produced that has the qualities of what old composers wrote and yet had certain novelty and sense of being in touch with the times, it is likely aficionados would enjoy it. Big events have come to pass even apart from the World Wars. Yet, they failed to inspire memorable music cast in the classical mold. 

That is likely a problem statement too. At some point Rite of Spring became the way to convey the feeling of Spring as opposed to the Spring movement in The Four Seasons. For some the  feelings, sounds, and sights of spring make for "real" music not the  polyphonic texture with different instruments playing at the same time that is meant to invoke the sense of Spring

Checking Out

I remembered my grocery list too late and Walmart was my only option by then. At the checkout lines that evening was predominantly Afghan. I live close to the neighborhood in my town where refugees arrive are helped by a number of community and faith-based organizations to establish in America. So seeing a bunch of young Afghans at the store was no surprise. There was only one among them that could speak English. The young man who was checking my items out had to match the item to a picture and he truly struggled to get things right. Behind me the line of frustrated and impatient customers was growing. The woman right before me had waited a long time as he struggled with her debit card. The English speaking friend was summoned many times during the process. 

It took forever but I was done. It had been a long day and I was not expecting my quick grocery run to take this long. I am sure the same was true to others there waiting behind me. As I put my things in the car and drove home, it occurred to me how a community gives and withholds at the same time. Many among us are working as volunteers to help these refugees in our town. Yet in this particular interaction with a young man seeking a new life in America as a refugee, no one was feeling kind, giving or charitable. We were just frustrated that a simple task took him as long as it did and with the number of mistakes he made along the way. We were not in the mood to think about the series of events that brought him here. A minute of consideration would highlight not getting the type of tomato right was very many orders of magnitude less wrong than the wrongs of America in that country. 

Nursed Love

Watched The Phantom Thread recently. The characters may not be average but the complications of the relationships are such that the average person can relate. In a healthy relationship there is smooth and easy back and forth transition of power. One person does not hold it the entire time but they get their fair and equitable turn. Things turn unhealthy when the transitions are no longer painless and without struggle - when power grows in one person at the cost of their partner whose only role in the relationship is to cede it. The greater the skew and unfairness the higher the level of toxicity in the relationship.

This story is about all that and yet how equilibrium is forced in the situation is rather unique. It reminded me of my cousin R who is only a few years older than me and had been bedridden for years - a tragedy the family wants to look away from because no one has a solution for what ails her. The husband oscillates between caregiving and ignoring her. We have to wonder if it is compassion fatigue or if he just an unkind person who has been exposed in his true colors given the conditions.

This has been the pattern they have established for over a decade now - sometimes the doting partner concerned about everything and then the mentally and physically absent one who cannot be reached even in crisis. Somehow that unpredictable tension keeps their marriage in balance in ways no one but they can understand. Unfortunately R and her husband are not the only couple I know where some variation of this theme plays out in the relationship - hers is just at the extreme end of the spectrum. 

Free Tools

Always a fan of Photoshop never an owner of the product, this is exciting news for me - a chance to play with a fair set of the features in a free online version. Getting your prospective buyer used to a great product is the perfect way to increase the odd that they will buy. I was an early adopter of Tableau Public when they launched in 2010. I grew to love the product as I used it and with a year convinced my employer at the time to buy two licenses. 

I have converted many over the years to Tableau and some have gone on to become power users bringing adoption in their organizations. With Photoshop going democratic, many of us who had been on the sidelines admiring the software but unwilling to buy will jump at the chance to learn and experiment. Chances are many will convert to paid customers. Wish this had happened a long time back but better late than never.

Kitchen Spy

No surprise that a Chinese smart coffee maker collects data quietly. It would be ironic (but entirely plausible) that the same data will get sold to an American data aggregator that can now learn new insights about you by mashing your coffee drinking and behavior around the kitchen with your bank transaction data to glean some unique insight. They could find a way for the smart speaker in your car to take real-time action on such "insight" 

The Chinese coffee machine case "provides evidence as to the scale of the data privacy issues as more [Internet Of Things] IOT devices are adopted by consumers and businesses," says New Kite Data Labs. "IOT devices are widely known to suffer from widespread security shortcomings that are not generally covered by security patches."

Once such data collection practices become ubiquitous most consumers will stop caring. It will be the cost of having "conveniences" using smart devices and people maybe willing to pay. 

New Home

Love the idea of converting fallen trees into beautiful furniture. I did not realize all these trees were destined for the landfill:

..people are incentivized to dispose of trees “as quickly and cheaply as possible,” says Christensen. On top of that, there’s no established network to connect the arborists who manage tree removal with local millers who could take them off their hands. In a quest to create a closed-loop, circular model, Cambium uses software to connect both parties and help millers track, sell, and manage their inventory.

This process could work for the trees that are cut pre-emptively to prevent them from falling over the roof of a house and causing damage for instance.

Recently, I replaced some old light fixtures with modern more energy efficient ones. For days, I stared at the old fixtures hoping inspiration would strike and I would find a way to recycle them. It felt wrong to throw them away. Sadly, no ideas came to mind and after a month I donated them to the local Goodwill. Hopefully they will find a new home and not end up in a landfill. Having a network of artists and recyclers would have been great in this case too.

Dispensing Justice

This post about the protests in the wake of the Roe v. Wade leak (now a reality not just a possibility) reminds of the documentary on the subject I had watched a while ago. The justices at the time did not have to content with protestors demonstrating outside their homes and assassination attempts, but their decision making was influenced by family members. The fact that it is possible to sway the decision at all no matter which way the pressure comes from makes you question if the bedrock of the justice system, It is supposed to be objective, unbiased and unprejudiced. Clearly none of that is true. 

In our neck of the woods a local judge got a grand send-off on his retirement which puzzled many in the community because his record was very far from stellar. His claim to fame was that he dispensed "holistic justice". Some of his decisions ended having terrible outcomes for individuals and families. Reading about these rulings in the local papers back when he was still on the bench always made me wonder why the said judge even needed a law degree to dispense justice as he did. 

The caliber of work was no better than what a group of illiterate village elders in rural India might have doled out a hundred years ago. Like them he looked at the "big picture" and did what "commonsense" dictated - his personal prejudices played a very important role in the whole process. None of that requires a legal education and years of practice and training. Does not seem like things are that much better in the highest seat of justice in the land based on how the decisions are being doled out from there these days.

Beyond Range

Watched In a Lonely Place recently. The story is about love and fear, set in a time when societal norms were very different from what they are today. As the plot unfolds, the modern viewer must find a way to parse out the element of time and find the kernel that is story - a flawed man who is attractive but volatile in love with a kind, sweet-tempered woman. She loses power in the equation as soon as she falls in love - is no longer being wooed and pursued. 

The more she entangles herself emotionally, the greater her loss of agency and equilibrium. Dix Steele played by Bogart acts out in proportion to the woman's closeness to him. Dix needs a therapist well before he needs a relationship with anyone - but those were not the norms of the times. As his agent puts it - anyone who wants to deal with him needs to take the good with the bad. There was social  (and even medical) acceptance for behavior that would be considered outrageous today. 

The dynamic between Bogart and Grahame is played out brilliantly. There is a kind of man who cannot separate love from control and subsumption of the woman he loves. They naturally gravitate to the kind of woman who cannot calibrate how much of her self she must or will give up in the name of love - she does not realize she has the choice to give up none at all and that relationship would be as loving as it would be empowering. 

Married Self

 For a woman to decline marriage is still hard in India. This "first" of its kind marriage in a great act of courage. I was not familiar with the word or concept of sologamy - the concept is logical at some level and not at others. It begs the question of what is the operating definition of marriage these days when society allows for a variety of  "non-traditional" unions. To gain acceptance as another kind of marriage, there will need to be strength in numbers. If even say 10% of single women described their relationship status as "married to myself" it would no longer be something that could be ignored as some sort of distortion. For the longest time people have been described at being married to their work for instance. It would be the hyperbolic way to describe their degree of engagement with said work if the person was married and had a family. 

Under those circumstances, one would conclude that this person valued their work over everything else in their life. However, if the person was single it would connote that they were completely fulfilled and occupied by their avocation and there was no space in their life for things like spouse, children and concomitant responsibilities. Either way this was never considered wrong or distorted - some people are just made this way, they need to focus on their life's cause. That would be a sort of sologamy too. Stripped of the ceremonial aspects not much that separates the two. It's just a matter of normalizing how one would describe their status to the world. Maybe we will get to the time when it becomes politically incorrect to get into specifics of how you and to whom you are married. For many that would be a welcome change

Long Road

 Listening to this quote by Theroux during my walk recently was most timely "the cost of a thing is the amount of what I will call life which is required to be exchanged for it, immediately or in the long run". The audiobooks I listen to can be a hit or miss, but some authors generously share the wisdom of others (such as in this case) that make it worth my while.

In the context of my present life where I am pursuing goals for no defined reason other than that I don't know what else to do, am too afraid to stop without knowing what is next. And unless I stop, breathe and think I will never know what is next and so in a classic Catch-22, I will never stop to discover what is good and right for me. In the meanwhile, I am expending copious amounts of this thing called life. The minutes and hours will all be consumed in the pursuit of things that do not hold intrinsic value for me. 

In my younger years, I was never one to shy away from risk or choose not to do things because others said that it would not work. I had far less stability then and much more to lose and yet I took chances and many of those were good calls. But now it seems like I just cannot "give up" what took a long time to reach. Just because the the journey was long or hard does not make the destination right. 

Tripping Up

I would not know the difference between a dead father and an absent one. My father is thankfully still alive and if anything he was always hyper-present in my life. I have swung between resentment and gratitude for all that he has done and not done for me. 

It is far from the perfect relationship but I cannot imagine a world where he did not exist. If a person has grown up experiencing an absent biological father and the death of the adoptive one, that can create a void that nothing can fill. I have seen this up close and reading this essay helped me understand what it feels to be in that person's shoes. 

The loss of an absent father is complicated. It doesn’t always dominate, the way grief over a death might. It’s something you trip over, often when you are least expecting it.

I have seen some of this tripping up happen. A kid learning to ride the bike with his dad, a movie about a strong father daughter bond, an inside joke between a father and his adult son, a dad helping his daughter stow her luggage in the overhead bin of the plane - each event a speed bump, a reminder of what is absent and can never be. The choices between feeling sorry and a victim versus being brave and pretending dads are fairly redundant. Whichever the choice, there is a bit of bruising and wounding each time. 

Giving Up

In the last week, while traveling abroad I met a few American families with daughters around J's age. The had either done a study abroad program or are currently doing their masters in Europe. Consistently, the young women do not look forward to returning to the US. They are doing what they can to stay on - they see the quality of life as being much better overall and specially for a woman now. 

One young lady told me she does not want to waste her life trying to fix what is broken in America - this coming from a law student with interest in constitutional law. Instead she wants to take care of her own life and find a place where she can live without having her rights taken away one by one.  She described it at as a level of broken that can no longer be fixed in one lifetime. This conversation was extremely reminiscent of those I had with friends in my college days - just about everyone agreed that there was no way to fix India and certainly not something they would put any effort into. The scale of dysfunction was dizzying and impossible to fathom. 

We felt we had a much better chance of making it if we kept the focus limited - getting our own lives on track and helping immediate family along the way. Decades later, that is what everyone I went to college has done - and successfully too. An overwhelming majority left India. Those that stayed behind now have very privileged lives with enough money to create a thick layer of insulation between them and all that is broken about India. They live there but they don't live the experience of the average Indian. This is what survival entails. These young women have given up on America in much the same way - this is no longer the country they can relate to or feel they have any claim in.

House Cleaning

It has been an intense few days getting my house in order. The detritus from times past needed cleaning up to make way for the here and now. Once I got started, it became impossible to stop until that degree of order had been achieved. Something that would make the past go away like a bad dream, dredge out every last shred of it and leave things clean. When I embarked on this purge journey, I had no idea what "done" would look and feel like. It was supposed to be one of those - you know it when you see it. The first day it was over ten hours of work with some short pauses. My appetite had completely disappeared by then. The next morning, I was back at it and with lesser intensity but still plugged away until midnight. Day three saw me sore and spent from running on fumes. The job was just about done but not quite. Dropping of the remains of what had once been my life to the thrift store was the final step in the deep detox. That was also the first time I experienced any feeling of hunger. 

Lately, I have been talking to my parents about what's next- when should they plan to move in with me. If they don't like that option then how would they manage when they were no longer able to fend for themselves. Even the preliminary conversations have proven very stressful for them and they don't like going there. My weekend of deep-cleaning and wading through accumulated stuff helped me understand how they might feel asking if they want to be uprooted in entirety from their lives. Their roots go way deeper than mine, the history is more complex and longer. It also made me think about my friend A whose octogenarian father is slated to come to America leaving his world and life behind. He feels terribly alone after the demise of his wife but is coming to America the right answer for him - only time will tell.