Heartcrossings

I finished listening to Shantaram on audiobook after several weekends of being absorbed in the story. This book had been on my to-read list for a long time and I am glad I chose the audio version of it. It is an extraordinary story teeming with colorful characters and rich detail. As an Indian who is a stranger to Mumbai and Maharashtra in that I have never spent years of my life there. I have to rely on what I know second hand. As a fan Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance, where in my mind I imagined the action taking place in Mumbai, this book was a chance for me to know the city through another author even if an Australian.  The author,  Gregory David Roberts comes across as someone who is able to see the soul of India through all that ails it. And in connecting with that soul, he finds some answers to his life's hard questions. India does not save him but it keeps his soul alive and striving. Most of his experiences would be unrelatable to the average person who lives a far m...

Back when I first started blogging, I often read Dooce . There was much to learn and be inspired by from her writing. After she died, I have visited her blog sometimes, reading the older posts. Today, I read the one mostly about her daughter. These lines brought a smile to my face:  Three years before she was born I was sitting across a table from her father at Canter’s Deli on Beverly Blvd. in Los Angeles and thought, “I want my children to inherit this man’s eyes.” Of the many ways she resembles her father, it is the color and the shape of her eyes that bear the hallmark gene of an Armstrong most. J's father had the most beautiful eyes I have known any man to have. They were almost too beautiful to be a man's eyes. He wore glasses and that obscured the best feature of his face. In the early days of our marriage, I often asked him to remove his glasses so I could stare at his eyes. There was something dreamy and scary about looking at them directly. I knew I would never know t...

What is true about workers and the workplace is only an extension of what people value in life - the expectation of respect  ..the study found that over half (54 percent) of employees claimed that they don't regularly get respect from their leaders, suggesting less engagement, more turnover, and less focus and productivity at work -- all costly factors stemming from disrespectful behaviors. I have had plenty of inept managers who have no emotional intelligence to speak of. They should have never become people managers yet they were in those roles to the great detriment of those who they managed. The lack of respect is always the hallmark of this kind of leader. No surprise the team has no cohesion and the turnover is high and contagious.  One manager I had constantly glanced at his smart watch during our 1:1s tuning out of whatever we were talking about and acting bored. He clearly did not want to go through this torturous thirty minute ritual every week. He showed up la...

The job market is incredibly confusing these days and has been this way for a while. Several folks in my network found themselves without work starting late last year into the beginning of this year. They have been in the market for months and their struggles until they landed a job. The stories are consistent - what used to work before does not any more. There is no sense applying to jobs because the AI will screen your resume out, the match-making algorithms are bizarre to say the least. They are almost designed to weed out people who have a range of skills and abilities, the ones that would be the most valuable for the employer. Mostly the set that makes it past the ATS know how to game the system and a very small subset of that actually knows how to do the job. It is no surprise that a woman with 20+ year sales career was being prompted to apply to call center rep jobs at minimum wage. All the things this story talks about. Many are convinced that job-matching features powered by ...

Red, White & Royal Blue was a feel-good movie which struck the right balance despite the story being improbable at may levels. A lot of wishful what if makes up the cast of characters. A black woman as the British PM, a female US President with a Hispanic husband and bisexual son in love with a British prince who is gay. It works out well for all concerned - there is peace and joy in the world, everyone loves the lovers. The characters are comfortable being who they are - no one seems to be trying to hard to convey any particular message.  The movie is a nicely done romantic story that does not try to be preachy or moralistic. The viewer is left to make what they want with - be entertained or think about the art of the possible or both. It is a fairy tale and a love story Cinderella style - a working class boy and a prince are involved. The big theme is about the right to pursue personal happiness while being publicly visible and being expected to live up to public expectation...

My friend L has a daughter going into high school this year. The middle school years were tough for this kid. From being happy and outgoing in elementary school she turned reclusive and mopey in middle school.  Its almost as if she wished to become invisible the spotlight that shone on the attractive and athletic and made the imperfections of the rest that much more pronounced. I have know this kid most of her life and know her to be bright, funny and curious. She was always comfortable in conversations with adults and older kids.  “Children who are not attractive and children who are not athletic become increasingly unpopular over time, suggesting that they must endure the indignities of powerlessness to remain attached to the peer group, a position that eventually takes a toll on individual well-being,”  Thankfully for this child, the struggles of middle school did not result in her resorting to any kind of substance abuse. But it definitely diminished her potential to...

Reading these lines from On Writing Well made me smile at the times when I have done exactly the things the author enjoins: Don’t use adverbs unless they do necessary work. Spare us the news that the winning athlete grinned widely. And while we’re at it, let’s retire “decidedly” and all its slippery cousins. Every day I see in the paper that some situations are decidedly better and others are decidedly worse, but I never know how decided the improvement is, or who did the deciding, just as I never know how eminent a result is that’s eminently fair, or whether to believe a fact that’s arguably true. “He’s arguably the best pitcher on the Mets,” the preening sportswriter writes, aspiring to Parnassus, which Red Smith reached by never using words like “arguably.” Is the pitcher—it can be proved by argument—the best pitcher on the team? If so, please omit “arguably.” Or is he perhaps—the opinion is open to argument—the best pitcher? Admittedly I don’t know. It’s virtually a toss-up Keepin...

Found this story about the  use of lava lamps by Cloudfare  oddly uplifting. A return to simplicity to do things that are seen as technically complex and inscrutable to most people. The average user of Uber might not get the finer points of how internet traffic is encrypted but everyone can appreciate the beauty of a lava lamp and from there how they can be used in ways that might seem unusual. Why use lava lamps for encryption instead of computer-generated code? Since computer codes are created by machines with relatively predictable patterns, it is entirely possible for hackers to guess their algorithms, posing a security risk. Lava lamps, on the other hand, add to the equation the sheer randomness of the physical world, making it nearly impossible for hackers to break through. While you might think that such an important place would be kept in secret and locked off from the public, it’s actually possible for visitors to witness these lava lamps in person. Simply enter ...

Watched this documentary made by a British guy who walks across India retracing the steps of the Mahatma and investigating how the events that followed India's independence impacts Indians today. I was not sure what to make of that premise as Smart laid out his itinerary for the road-trip given his stated goals. The man decided the way to do it was to go from Kashmir to Kanya Kumari along the west coast of the country.  As someone born into a family of refugees from Bangladesh to Kolkata, I had big a problem with this. How can anyone tell a comprehensive story of partition in India without considering what happened in Bengal? So we would need to start by recasting this is a road-trip spanning the Northern and Southern tips of India. That is a valid way to discover some part of India but to pretend it is about exploring the aftermath of Partition is both disingenuous and disrespectful.  Smart failed to deliver on multiple counts unfortunately - this was not a good road-trip st...

These lines from Naomi Shihab Nye's So Much Happiness seems to answer the question why we don't recognize the times that we are truly and completely happy. The moments seem to slip away from weightlessness. Comes a point when you wonder if what you are experiencing was happiness in the raw or were there any snags and gaps that made it less than immaculate It is difficult to know what to do with so much happiness. With sadness there is something to rub against,  a wound to tend with lotion and cloth. When the world falls in around you, you have pieces to pick up, something to hold in your hands, like ticket stubs or change. With sadness there is no mistaking the state. There is proof you can hold on to like "ticket stubs". Reading Ten Poems to Set you Free  is a nice collection and the editor's thoughts on each one made for a more interactive experience. The reader comes to their own conclusions and then gets a chance to read what someone else thinks of it. This is...

Reading this news made me think that we might be inching towards a company town model so employers get their employees report to work every day and stop fussing about it. The pandemic gave way too many people the magic window of opportunity to immerse in their real lives, together with those who mean the most in their lives. It turns out an overwhelming majority really loved what they found there - getting in touch with their own humanity, experiencing the power of love and connection, the joys of being able to an active part of their children's life - these things do not begin to compare with showing up to the office to work. So its no surprise that employees are resistant to returning to the before times. They are questioning why this is needed when there is a more humane way to earn a living. The powers that be are trying a carrot and stick technique. This "discounted" hotel on campus is an oddity - is this a carrot or a stick or something in between. Maybe it is a ca...

Excellent essay on the radicalization of tech tycoons . This idea that a person is proven exceptional and smart if they make a lot of money is very real. It plays out in the words and actions of this collective that is broadcast loudly for all lesser mortals to hear. These "dudes" as the author characterizes them, make mind-bogglingly poor choices and "judgement calls" that end up having cataclysmic effects on those whose lives and livelihoods they control.  The rising power of movements meant to counter their influence has catalyzed a vicious, and frankly very weird, backlash where they want to put everyone else in their place. And, due to the insularity of their lifestyles, they very seldom have any corrective voices pointing out when they've clearly lost the plot. If it weren't for the deep harm they were doing to so many with these radical ideas, I'd have a lot of pity and empathy for the fact that they're clearly acting out due to social isolati...

Good read about how fatigue is hard to fight physically and socially. In speaking of people who are not done recovering from covid while others have moved on: ..Long-haulers must resist the enormous cultural pressure to prove their worth by pushing as hard as they can. They must tolerate being chastised for trying to avert a crash, and being disbelieved if they fail. “One of the most insulting things people can say is ‘Fight your illness,’” Misko said. That would be much easier for her. “It takes so much self-control and strength to do less, to be less, to shrink your life down to one or two small things from which you try to extract joy in order to survive.” For her and many others, rest has become both a medical necessity and a radical act of defiance—one that, in itself, is exhausting.   In the workplace if is quite common to hear people talk about "powering through" being unwell, wearing it is a badge of honor that they can do that. It is show of both physical and mental...

Read these beautiful lines in a poem in Jane Hirshfield's Ledger As things grow rarer, they enter the ranges of counting. Remain this many Siberian tigers, that many African elephants. Three hundred red-legged egrets. We scrape from the world its tilt and meander of wonder as if eating the last burned onions and carrots from a cast-iron pan. Closing eyes to taste better the char of ordinary sweetness. The idea of entering the "ranges of counting" was something I turned around in my mind many times after I read this. The years left to live for one - for those who happen to know when the end will come. From there it becomes possible to count months and days. I often experience this when talking to the elderly in my life - how much do they think about what is left that is in the range of counting. What makes it worthwhile to count and what to count. 

It makes sense that sea water is therapeutic . People are drawn to beach and can't wait to return each year when the season is warm. There are memories from the time on the water we carry for the time between trips. The salt, water, sand, breeze and sun are like ingredients of which the dish of happiness is made. And there is no better treat that to watch children squealing with joy as they run back and forth into the waves. Some are content to collect shells or build sand-castles - they are no less happy than those in the water, just differently so. It is probably impossible for an adult to plunge into the experience of the beach in the way a child can. Tagore's poem On the Seashore is a wonderful celebration of this. They know not how to swim, they know not how to cast nets. Pearl-fishers dive for pearls, merchants sail in their ships, while children gather pebbles and scatter them again. They seek not for hidden treasures, they know not how to cast nets. The sea surges up w...

I had ChatGPT render an Alice Munro version of my recent blog post. Not sure it was able to strike the Munro notes but it made something out of my writing that it was not. Reading this feels experiencing writing as color by the numbers. I can't decide how I feel about it but it lacks personality and soul to my taste even if the writing has some stylistic flourishes mine does not. Its like the fanciful calligraphy on sign-boards in India . It grabs attention, has some artistic quality but it is not memorable. In the realm of culinary recollections, the notion of a food memoir strikes a chord within me, resonating with an intrinsic understanding. For it is true, the foods that hold the deepest significance in our hearts are intimately intertwined with the memories they evoke. These stories unfold in various settings - perhaps within the familiar walls of a cherished home kitchen, beside the bustling stall of a street-food vendor, or upon the hallowed grounds of a restaurant table. Ye...

Sometimes its entirely worth going back to the drawing board. And even more valuable to return to the roots of things - as far back as anyone can know or remember. That seems to the general point of architecture uprising in Scandinavia . Reading the story reminded me of a huge office-plex I had a chance to visit recently. The place was under development for years and then there was a grand opening. The promotional pictures looked great. Nothing prepared me for the reality it was - cold, depressing, soul-less and point-less. All the right elements had been incorporated and yet the whole thing did not work at all. I have seen far less opulent places that radiate warmth, happiness and energy.  This place was the very antithesis of it. It made me wonder what was so wrong about it - what pieces were missing that gave it such an unhappy vibe. I am no expert but maybe the Vaastu or Feng Shui or both are bad. Or maybe it veers too modern and what there should have been an uprising to retur...

I spent over a decade working with sales and business development folks until more recently I decided go do something different. That old life had its set of problems and aggravations but one thing was never in short supply - finding someone who wanted to shoot the breeze with me. This is the kind of job that attracts extroverted people who are resilient to rejection.  After spending months and even years on a deal, things could go sideways. But these folks all know how to shrug it off and start the new day with new energy. Recently, I don't work with sales people anymore and the world has somehow lost color it once had. I could be on an office floor full of people who refuse to make eye contact with anyone, have their ears plugged with headphone, their faces glued to one screen or another.  These crowd will only converse with those they know well based on some defining event that brought about such knowledge. They are not going to walk up to a random person and introduce them...

Watched Con Man recently and there were a couple of scenes that felt key to the evolution of the character. Both had to do with his parents. Minkow's father is shown as unsuccessful and struggling in his career unable to provide for the family. This was a man that had not been man enough to those who counted on him. This perception of the father seems like a big driver for Minkow's desire to show his family and the world that he can be the man his father has failed to be and many times over. There is the tacit approval and blind adulation from his parents of his early "accomplishments" which further push him down the destructive road he has started on. Between nature and nurture it seems to have set off an unstoppable flywheel effect.  Being able to con people is depicted to work much like an addiction - it is so easy, the high is so great that the best intentions can seem to stop Minkow. Plus there is the the theory that  fraudsters do not believe that what they are...

We reclaim the bruised years of the past where on a beach trip an ugly argument could have upended the vacation. The children did not know what they were meant to do. Every other family was out on the beach but in their hotel room the parents were feuding over things they did not understand. They wanted to be there by the water too - wasn't that why they were here. They were ready in their swim wear, had put on their sunscreen and had their beach toys in the tote. Today supposed to be a fun day - the sun was pleasant but not hot. They could hear the loud squeals of the children running back and forth from the waves that crashed down at the shore. They longed to be there too - make new friends, build sand castles, chase after crabs, collect sea-shells.  Maybe their father would teach them to use the surf-board on this trip. He was always trying to teach them something new - they loved that. After an hour, he took them out to the water. Their mother said she would not go with them - ...

Back at the beach again for a day and a night, trying to strike balance between availing good weather while it lasts and avoiding the end of summer crowds. It turned out to be just that - somewhere in the middle of two goals each somewhat fulfilled. The tide was high and the waves thick white froth. We watched seagulls fly in formation and sand pipers chase after baby crabs. The rhythm of life around the ocean continued notwithstanding the ebb and flow of crowds. As the weekend drew to a close, the beach started to empty out. A few straggling tents and umbrellas dotted the vast expanse of emptiness. We remained that that night. There is been clamor for more mental health days for people - at work and at schools.  Taking a Monday off was my equivalent of that. There was no house on fire, nothing too terrible happening at work that I needed escape from it. It is more a death by thousand cuts - it bleeds slow but steady. Purgatory in a person's professional life I think is created whe...

My childhood friend C has somewhere between three to five years left to live according to the statistical survival rates for her condition. A few days ago we spend a couple of hours talking about random things, gossip, work life balance (or the lack of it), memories from long ago days and so on. She talked about her condition and treatment - the fact that she is doing reasonably well at the moment. We made plans to visit each other. I did not tell her I felt a great sense of urgency - if I could take off a week next month, I would do that, take the train from Healthrow that would bring me right to her house.  But it felt wrong to act so desperate. She said this year would be hard for her to travel she promised next year to come over. Talking to C was wonderful - at the core of her is the person I always knew her to be. She refuses to feel old or sick - always the fighter and never one to shy away from an unsurmountable challenge. That is how she has achieved the things she has in l...

This story about fruit flies got me thinking about the contagious effect of bad news of all kinds. Lately, I have had more than my usual share of bad news about friends and family - folks of my age, people I have been close to. Apart from ongoing concern about them and wanting things to improve so we can all move on after the "false alarm" there is also a sense of foreboding - who might be next. On the bright side, it makes me want to try harder to hold on to what is good, acknowledge more regularly that those things exist. In the end what is true for fruit flies may be true for us humans too.  Understanding more about how flies’ brains transform their physiology to accelerate the ageing process might pave the way for new treatments to slow ageing in humans, the scientists suggest. But one possibility is that all that death simply gets the flies down, and eventually becomes too much. “Given our findings,” the authors write, “it seems plausible that the sight of dead conspeci...

Reading about these contrarian bird-nests , reminded me of some crazy and persistent birds I have known over the years. Back when I was child, we lived in a house where the dining area opened into the courtyard. There were two doors, one wooden and the other cast-iron grill. In the warmer months the wooden door was never shut during the day. One summer a couple of birds decided to come visiting through the grill and flapping around in front of the mirror that hung over a wash-basin across from the dining table. At first, we found their antics amusing but their behavior went from silly to crazy to scary in degrees. They would peck at the mirror non-stop and we worried they would hurt themselves. We started to shoo them away and shut the wooden door one they were done.  But the heat was oppressive and we would need to open it at some point and they would be back soon thereafter and resume their ferocious attack of the mirror. This went on all until the weather turned cooler and there...

The idea of Loose Ends is so beautiful. There are so many reasons a labor of love may remain unfinished. To create a community around the problem and solve it is genius in simplicity. The job description would make person who has the skills jump for joy : As a crafter, you understand that a handmade gift is priceless. The materials and hours that go into making something for a loved one are a gesture of love. Thank you for your interest in signing up to finish a project. Your efforts will reconnect a bereaved individual with a garment or accessory that was begun for them by a loved one. I wish I was a crafter of any sort at all - this would be such a rewarding thing to do. Finish things, give life to what would have died unloved and untended otherwise. Become entwined with that object that will go on to bring joy to someone and be part of that happy story. No surprise that people are very enthusiastic .. The explosion of interest has stunned the group's founders. They've appli...

Over the hill and in look back at used to be land. It was there where the joys were sparse like fireflies on a dank summer night. The heat had a bite that crushed the soul. There are welts of  pain both given and received. The salt of tears yours and mine Burning craters where love could not have been. This side of the hill lies years and just knowing that it ends somewhere. Birthdays are different now

The quest for profit at all costs often goes with descent into pure stupidity as this story highlights The extent of learning loss was closely correlated to the amount of time that students had spent doing remote learning, on a screen, rather than receiving direct instruction, and here companies were offering more screen-based instruction as the remedy. Few of the companies on hand were proposing to replace the classroom experience entirely with virtual instruction, but to the degree that their offerings recalled the year-plus of Zoom school, it could be a bit awkward. “A lot of people don’t like us, because we can do remote-school stuff,” said Michael Linacre, a salesperson for StarBoard Solution, before demonstrating one of the cool things a StarBoard whiteboard could do: He jotted 1+2= with his finger and up popped 3. “There’s a mixed feeling about that now.” The great remote-school experiment was recently concluded and for most it did not work so great. But there is not much oppor...

Lot of emphasis on external factors to look sharp at work but not enough on spending time and effort on overall health. For as long as I have been or or worked with folks in customer facing rules, more often than not the women I am around carry common denominator designer bags, wear relatively expensive clothes and accessories. I will focus on the attire of women because that is most relatable for me. In a crowd like that, its very hard if not impossible to get that thin-slice attention span credit for looking the sharpest of them all. There is a level of affluence that the group simply cannot exceed to become a few standard deviations removed from the average of the pretty well-dressed crowd. So despite having put good time and money into the look, it will only get them a solid average standing.  Early on, I decided to go a different route and get closer to my Indian roots with choice of colors, fabrics and accessories. There are no designer labels involved - I pick things becaus...

When we were growing up, A's dad was by consensus opinion the fun dad - the kind that provoked envy from the rest of us who had regular dads who did non-fun dad things. This man could participate in our conversations, see the humor of our juvenile jokes and tell us stories that made us laugh. So when A told me his father is developing dementia, I had to ask him if his personality is still the way it once used to be. According to A, his dad forgets things that were said in the last hour but has absolutely vivid memories of the past going back to his early childhood. It seems like the farther back in time he goes, the more he is able to retrieve. So the memories of the time when A and I were kids is still intact so chances are I would see the flashes of the person he used to be then even now.  On this most recent visit home, A's dad recited from memory the entire Ghalib poem he had used to woo his mother with some sixty years ago. They were sitting together as a family with A...

The concept of a  food memoir makes sense to me intuitively. The food we care most about is always on account of the memories associated with them. The story around that dish could have been in a home - a kitchen in that home, by a street-food vendor's stall or a restaurant table. The venue is less important than the story that unfolds there and the connection the person makes with the food. Interesting idea in this essay about performing the recipe instead of following it. The idea that something can be performed automatically lends itself to improvisation and and exercise of creative freedom. If the recipe calls for canned tomatoes surely fresh is just as good if not better. Why only fresh basil if there is also fresh cilantro on hand. What could some diced jalapeno peppers hurt even none were required by the recipe. The person performing it should have their stylistic signature on the performance.  Not every actor that performs Othello performs it the same way and that is ...

Bizarre business with Apple trying to secure IP protections over the depictions of the fruit.  Apple has precedent in Switzerland. In 2010 the trillion-dollar company got a small Swiss grocers’ cooperative to enter into an out-of-court agreement declaring it would never add a bite mark to its logo—a bright red apple inside a shopping caddy—something which, according to the cooperative’s president at the time, was “never planned.” Extending the logic, say a parent posted an image of their baby taking their very first bite of an apple on social media, they can expect to hear from Apple about it. God forbid, that image goes viral for whatever random reason that governs such events and some entrepreneurial type decides to start a line of merchandize themed on the bitten apple.  For the Swiss apple growers, “millions” are at stake if they have to rebrand following a decision. “We’re not looking to compete with Apple; we have no intention of going into the same field as them,”...