Shop Pause

Like many I have clothes in my closet that look like new because they were worn so infrequently but are not in style anymore. Since I did not buy them because they were in style at the time but because I liked how they looked on me (at the time), this does not pose and impediment for me. But out in the world, I could stick out as someone who lacks awareness of what women should wear this day and age. 

Reading news like this makes me strongly inclined not to buy any new items of clothing for the next several years. I am very sure I will manage quite comfortably and will never look "fashionable" by the influencer driven standards of the day. For me and other who shop based on what they like and what works for them, this is a great opportunity to create unique expression that depends on what we already have. A constrained problem gets people to become creative in ways that they might not have been before. 

..tariffs will ultimately impact women more than men because women spend more money on average on clothing. In 2023, household spending on women’s apparel averaged $655, compared with $406 for men’s apparel, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

As part of my plan to make my current wardrobe serve me well for a long period of time without any additions, I started to give away what I absolutely don't and won't need. There is a pile of items that I believe have some vintage potential - I have had some of them for many decades and they still make sense and would look fine on me but I just want a pause from them and revisit once I have forgotten their existence - feel the newness again. 

Steady Beat

 At a routine check up, the nurse measured my pulse and as is the case when things are as they should be, she said nothing about. It got me thinking about how we came to agree on a certain pulse rate being normal and if that number had anything at all to do with the earth's pulse rate of once in 26 seconds. It turns out there is some connection but not so directly - that would be way too simplistic for nature

238 measurements from 184 individuals over a 3.5 year period “demonstrated unexpected similarities in the spectral patterns and strengths of electromagnetic fields generated by the human brain and the earth-ionospheric cavity.”

A few weeks after the check-up I was at a guided meditation practice with a group of people I had never met before. We were all there to learn how to make meditation integral to our lives. Most folks had attempted or already had some form of meditation practice in their lives, but it felt insufficient in some way. This was a first time experience for me trying to meditate with a group other than the little breathwork that is common in yoga class. Somewhere midway through the session, it felt like there was some resonant frequency in the room that that helped everyone get further along than they would have on their own. The earth's pulse rate came to mind one again and the notion of what feels harmonious and "normal" and what does not. 

Letting Go

My friend H is in her mid 60s and she had worked for a well-known SaaS company for over a decade. Things had been going great for her the last five years, the team she was on really appreciated the value of her skill and experience. Her manager, a couple of decades younger than her took on a reverse mentoring role with her. H needed no help with doing her job well and scaling so others could become like her, but she did appreciate the mentoring on topics that she found harder to grasp given the generation gap. A few months ago, the company went through a major restructuring and H no longer had the job she had worked on so hard to come to love. The first few weeks were rough and she went through all stages of grief. 

Now she's back to being herself, not quite ready to retire but close enough. While she is not excited about not working (or that is what she tells herself and her friends), she looks happier than I have ever seen her in her pictures. She's around the house doing mundane things she likely never had much time for until now. Baking chicken perfectly will get H excited and she'll share pictures of her accomplishment with us. This is a woman who had significant career accomplishments but I can't remember a single time that she shared any of it with friends in a group chat. She'd do the obligatory LinkedIn post and we'd respond but that stayed there. 

I don't think the chicken baked with rosemary from her garden will feature on LinkedIn but the joy that it brings her is unmistakable. I want a bit more time to go by before I ask H if she is not infact happy with the way things have turned out despite the initial panic and the big waves of sadness and disappointment. There is I think a path for H that leads to her happy place and being at home and doing things that brighten her day will lead to it.

Teaching Values

Learned about the origin story of Snakes and Ladders randomly and was amazed at how long it is possible to remain ignorant. Such a clever way to impart moral instruction to children - something I could have greatly benefitted from as a mother when I was raising J. 

The snakes and ladders in gyan chaupar function as karmic devices, either thwarting or aiding a player’s efforts to reach moksha. To emphasise this, the squares from which the tokens either ascend or descend were labelled with names of various virtues or flaws. The positive attributes listed were dependability, asceticism, faithfulness, generosity and knowledge, while the negative attributes and crimes included rebelliousness, vanity, crudeness, theft, lust, debt and violence

It was interesting to see the modern take on the game aimed at teaching kids. This is a more secular spin on the original intent, informed by the concerns and moral dilemmas of our time. 

Ancient Living snakes & ladders board game is handcrafted and beholds a different take altogether, which is in sync with the aspects affecting environment. While ladders come with positive messages like organic farming, rainwater harvesting, use solar power, reuse & recycle and use paper wisely, factors which degrade the environment like cutting down forests, melting of glaciers, using plastics and oil spills portray the negative impacts are associated with snakes that bring you down and make you lose position.

Finding Home

There is a gloomy way to read this story about scientists fleeing America and then a more hopeful one along the lines of a rising tide lifts all ships. If there were great options for research all around the world, science might come out ahead. The talent from America would be fused with the local talent that may have ideas that could not have come without them being a product of that society and culture - things that did not get exported by just remained there. 

One hopes most if not all of the research will be published and accessible around the world. In that scenario, the world benefits from the mashup of talent and intelligence at a scale that had not happened before. Who know how reality will unfold in years to come but I like imagining the better, more hopeful outcome anyway. It is great to see that there are harboring arms for our best and brightest around the world. 

Last month, France's CentraleSupélec announced a $3.2 million grant to help finance American research that had been halted in the states. And Netherlands Minister of Education, Culture and Science Eppo Bruins wrote in a letter to parliament that he requested to set up a fund aimed at bringing top international scientists to the Netherlands.

There is some evidence that these entreaties are reaching curious ears.

It is possible that there will come a time, when these folks will have a reason and incentive to return to America and bring back a lot more than they had felt with.

Sea Change

It had been almost I year since I last saw L and this meeting was on the brink of not happening. But we did get coffee at the place we both love and as always there was much that I learned in the couple of hours. She mentioned working with an engineering team that has veered between being hostile and rejective about using AI to ramp their productivity to being in public denial but using it surreptitiously. The later almost did not make sense because in her company there is a push for AI adoption all the way from the top. So it would only help rank and file SDEs to toe the line.

Recently after a minor release was pushed out, over half the users were locked out of the system causing a terrific amount of chaos, fire-fighting and blamestorming. L was in the thick of it all, trying to assess root cause, implementing checks to prevent it and non-stop damage control. That was the week leading up to our coffee chat. She look completely exhausted. It turns out that the culprit was some AI generated code, being reviewed automatically (another AI I presume) and the human being the final backstop. 

The human in question was one of those tenured engineers who hated AI with his guts and did not believe it was able to provide any measurable benefit to the likes of him. He had apparently reviewed this bit of code pre-release but not caught something that seemed to be pretty obvious. L chalked it up to him being disenchanted and disengaged ever since the brass started to make it near mandatory for developers to use the set of AI tools the company had provided to do more with less. Then the question was if B had infact been delinquent in doing his job as the code reviewer or it he had relied too much on AI having seen prior releases had gone without a hitch. 

The bigger question for L as she moves into a new role with much larger remit is how she should message the use of AI for her team which will include technical and non-technical folks. Her own preference is to leave it up to the person and only measure outcomes and value delivered, not interfere with the process but she does have to drive the AI adoption mandate. Clearly, she did not come upon any clarity that afternoon as we chatted. I shared this story with her in hopes that other voices might help her with it. 

Talking Presence

Read these lines on my LinkedIn feed and it was reconfirmation of all that ails the platform and a reminder that no true alternative exists. The person was claiming they rose to the level of X and company Y because they have the executive presence to command a room. Having known many execs from said company in the past, I am well-aware of the what that entails. It is about an aggressive diminishment of others who are way better qualified than the person at level X, more articulate and thoughtful than the person with the vaunted presence is but they are at level X-N which is their undoing. Also to their detriment, these folks are more human, relatable and therefore vulnerable to the passive-aggressive tactics used to undermine everything they say or do. But ofcourse this guy will not admit to any of that but it is unlikely he is not aware of what he does to maintain command of the room.

I have also seen in folks who are deeply trusted advisors to their client's executive leadership teams. They are asked for their opinion and encouraged be completely candid even if that means ruffling some feathers. My former co-worker S was in a league of his own. Once he started to present, a hush descended in the room. His facts were current upto the last 24 hours, he could hold all data points about the company he was advising even if the relationship went back a decade. He knew their business and competitors better than anyone else in the room, including the most tenured leaders. His word was often the final and got big decisions made and unmade. 

S was unfailing polite, treated everyone on the client's team with the same respect - junior business analyst two years out of college to the CEO. That is the definition of executive presence and being able to command the room. Not what this guy is posturing about. S posts on LinkedIn maybe twice a year and its totally worth reading what he has to say. I wish there was more like S in my professional network, they are the folks that make a person better and smarter. 

Waking Unsettled

Sleeping in a strange hotel room with a trash compactor working past 2 am is unpleasant. Then you realize there is a reason there are earplugs on the bedside table. This place always churns the guts of downtown at that ungodly time. I have been here before and forgot all about it. This is the amnesia that takes hold between my trips to this city where I feel mildly out of place no matter how many times I return. Something is off from the time I board the plane to here and see people carrying the backpacks with company logos on them. That is the majority of the travelers. I am one of them but I am trying to bury all signs of my provenance. I don't dress in the way that is the norm for my type - comfortable, casual and repeatable. The person does not have to have a uniform like the infamous black turtleneck but there are strong elements of uniform in concept - they would look much the same every time you saw them.

There is one look and they are settled in it. So imagine my surprise I walk into the office building, sleep deprived from the trash compactor sounds all night and see a woman walk down the stairs in a beautiful floor length floral skirt paired with a black top and nice gold jewelry. She stands out from the uniformed masses and makes me less self-conscious about opting out of uniform and being myself - that could mean different colors, patterns and styles over a period of time - lack of consistency. It seems we are both signaling that we don't wanted to be opted-in to default behavior and want to forge our own path - hers much bolder than mine which I am really happy to see. The woman fades out into one of the conference rooms and there I am in a sea of uniform the only splash of color and life gone. 

Leaving Room

I had the chance to watch a very well-known Bharatnatyam dancer while on a work trip. It just so happened she was performing the night I was there and there was plenty of time to get to the theatre after work. This was the first time I had seen her perform but was familiar with her reputation. To say that she was dazzling is an understatement but what left me feel unsatisfied in the end was her choice to breathe new life into a very traditional art form. For someone whose first introduction to the dance came from watching friends perform at their Arangetrams, my expectations were quite different from the modern show that unfolded on stage. 

There were passages there were her brilliance shone and yet before you could fully immerse in it, she would have moved on to more modern interpretive moves that broke the spell. I understand that western audiences might prefer they way she choreographed the dance but folks like me missed out. On the way out of the auditorium a couple of young ladies (most likely university students) were chatting about how they had seen her perform back home and how different that experience had been. They had presumably come for an encore and were disappointed. For a few minutes, I bonded with them on this sentiment. We concluded that she had to do the "showy" stuff while abroad to be relevant to the folks who came to watch her. One of the two women was a dancer herself, a relative novice but far more educated on the subject than me. She had a much longer catalog of things that missed the mark.

On the way back home, I was thinking about this immensely talented dancer who had dedicated her whole life to the art. Even that was not enough to please everyone - and we are not talking about experts and connoisseurs - this is just regular folks with merely passing familiarity with her subject. It helped put in context the mountain of feedback I received on some work product recently. It was a bit overwhelming but it was easy enough to take action on most of it and I did. This woman is way too talented for that - she has a searingly clear vision about dance, she would not be here but for that. 

Beyond Number

My former co-worker C is an Excel artist too just that he uses it in more conventional ways as a data scientist. When I first started in that team, I was introduced to C as the one with all the answers and the reasons for those answers. It sounded cryptic at the time but I understood why that was said of him within a couple of months. If you did not understand a number and asked C for help, you would get a deep-dive that would leave you deeply impressed. He knew so many layers of detail about every cell of the summary tab of his fabled spreadsheet, that you would leave dazzled. 

And there was always more to add if you came back with another question another time. It was if we were looking at the spreadsheet in completely different ways. He probably saw shape, form, color, and texture in each cell where someone like me only saw numbers. That was the only way to explain how he explained things. When C moved on to bigger, better things, he was replaced by someone more "traditional". A sharp data science guy who saw the numbers, could make sense of it all, and could competently do the job. None of us has any complaints about him but this was no artist like C for sure. We learn to adjust our expectations with time. 

“I never used Excel at work but I saw other people making pretty graphs and thought, ‘I could probably draw with that,’” says 73-year old Tatsuo Horiuchi. About 13 years ago, shortly before retiring, Horiuchi decide he needed a new challenge in his life. So he bought a computer and began experimenting with Excel. “Graphics software is expensive but Excel comes pre-installed in most computers,” explained Horiuchi. “And it has more functions and is easier to use than [Microsoft] Paint.”

Changing Tide

I started to read this opinion piece with interest given the context the author cited he had but ended up a bit disappointed when he described the aftermath of demonetization in India. This is something I have been in the midst of quite directly having retired parents living in Kolkata for the longest time. As it happens, I have been to the UK several times before and after Brexit. May not have lived in either place at the time these events were unfolding but close enough. 

Covering the demonetization experiment in India as a journalist, we spent a day basically trying to get someone to break the equivalent of $50. It took all day and after a couple hours I actually started to feel like a unique form of dread. Like what if your money just suddenly didn't work anymore.

Roll forward a couple years, nothing has radically changed about India. I was there in 2014 before this happened and again in 2018. If I compare my experience of India in these two trips separated by four years with demonetization falling in the exact center, I would not be able to call out anything particularly notable. Life goes on. My parents and other relatives who lived on retirement income through this entire time, did not have their lives transformed. 

There was a fair amount of anxiety at the time of demonetization but the dust settled remarkably fast for regular people. In the UK, as a foreigner visiting for short periods of time it was harder for me to see the full picture but there were no visible signs of crisis in grocery stores, malls, restaurants and the like. The exchange rate made things a bit cheaper and locals I met along the way seemed unsure of what had hit them. Many were ambivalent about whether the decision was good or bad. Much the same with India's demonetization. It seems like people learn to work with the hand they are dealt. I imagine such will be the case for Americans as well. 

Infinitely Here

Reading this story about the author's experience with Tinder's Game Game reminded me of the article on Therabot. They seem to somewhat related. Not everyone who is single is good at flirting but it is a skill they need to be successful - hence the AI coach to help them improve their game. It is awkward to enlist a friend to help hone flirting skills and for some seeing a live therapist may be both awkward and expensive. Also, there is no guarantee that the therapist will be useful even if they are skilled and have helped others - they might just not be a fit for you. Finding the right one could take time and cause a lot of frustration along the way. There is enough disincentive for a person to not even embark on this journey.

 An AI therapy bot has a lower bar - they should not cause any harm. Even if they are entirely useless they cost very little, are available on demand and you can always try another one. Somewhere along the way, the bots might communicate some nuggets of wisdom or at least get you thinking in the right direction. That is help. And such might be the case with the Tinder bot. Irrespective of whether you succeed or fail, there could be good pointers to be had on improving your communication skills which transfers to situations outside dating. Maybe the right way to think about these things is a way to talk things through with someone who has good intent but not much else. The fact that is resource is endlessly available is a big plus too. 

Large Adversity

Fascinating read about the accomplishments of a woman I had never heard about. Her accomplishments are remarkable no doubt but what struck me the level of adversities she had to face in her life which brought equal measures of famine and fast. Losing two members of her immediate family before attaining adulthood is tough enough. But she went on to marry someone who had lifelong mental health issues. She gave up her dream of becoming a doctor on account of this marriage. Yet she was incredibly rich and had access to opportunities other did not and she maximized it all. I can think of so many stories of people accomplishing extraordinary things in their lives and just about all of them had some terrible set of circumstances that defined them. If a person was so lucky as to not have endured any serious calamity in their lives, they will likely not achieve significant greatness either. 

Even on a much more reduced and local scale this seems to hold true from what I have observed in life. Made me wonder if a person who aspires for greatness in so doing also courts a great of tragedy in their lives. A young woman I know came to mind as I was writing this. She was on her way to decent success and a mundane life with a man she was going to marry and have kids with. Then one day she hit what seems to be a huge reset button. A life altering mishap came about and it forced her to come to a hard stop. A few months later, she emerged a changed person with new goals in life. The past has sloughed off her like dead skin. But for that sudden adversity, she'd be well on her way to a mediocre life. It is quite possible that she will now achieve greatness.

Seeing Chance

Reading this story about fancy housing options for rich students attending elite schools brought N to mind. She was a stay at home mom with two kinds. The husband was help run the family business in Rajasthan so he needed to be away in India a lot. N lived like a single mom and found a kindred spirit in me though our circumstances were very different. N came old money and while she was not flashy, it was hard not to notice the wealth, it sat simply and casually on her. At the time, I was working hard to keep J and I afloat in circumstances that I very little control of. I learned a lot about how rich people think about the future as I got to know N. 

She was hyper-focused on her two kids and that was not any different from me. But beyond that we were not alike at all. N was scouting for cheap properties near our local university that had rental potential after some minimal improvements. She ended up buying one, hiring contractors to do the work and then renting it out. That was the first of what would be a set of properties she'd end up owning. For N there was nothing remarkable about what she was doing. She was only putting her money to work - no different than she taking care of her kids and home. These were basic life functions a normal adult needed to do. I was ofcourse in complete awe of her. 

In her world, a person like me was not performing like a normal, functional adult. I imagine it was hard for her to understand why not - objectively her situation was much harder than mine even if money helped simplify things. She was just as hands-on with her kids and home as I was. She did not have service providers taking care of any of that. Yet she was able to focus her real estate investments. Her properties did not house the mega rich like those referred to in this story but there was never a time when she did not have tenants. 

New Measure

This seems to be a sensible way to measure the wealth of a nation - net domestic product specially if it incentivizes behavior that secures the prosperity of future generations.

One key difference, which could support climate action, is that NDP includes the depletion of non-renewable natural resources like coal, oil and gas as a cost of production, shrinking their value in the calculation.

Bram Edens, a statistician with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), explained that accounting for how reserves of fossil fuels are used up will reduce their value in the same way that the value of buildings or machinery falls due to the wear and tear they suffer over time

Ironically, this is the kind of measure we would apply in our personal lives. Are the actions we are taking result in short term gain at the cost of long term pain. If so, those actions are unwise. You don't tell off your boss or neighbor in a moment of upset because you know the moment of vindication will be over and tomorrow you will have reason to regret you actions. Applying the same kind of commonsense seems to become much harder for choices made at national scale.

Real Options

One of my nieces seems set on marrying a guy her parents and grandparents don't really approve of. The "calamity" has stirred a level of turbulence for this rather private family to the point they need and want to share. This kid is a few years older than J so I find the situation understandable. M loves the guy. has a lot in common with him. They are both at a stage in their career where marriage is no longer financially scary. Most importantly they've known each other for years. I chatted with M's granddad recently and this issue came up. He was not seeking any advice or guidance - only unburdening himself.

I provided some unsolicited wisdom anyway in hopes that it would help them all. I told him that M is a very smart and capable woman. If she has come to this conclusion after knowing the man for nearly a decade, chances are that their protests will on deaf ears at best or at worst alienate them from her. They would need to accept her decision and be there for her even if their fears about this union ever came true. If there are concerns that are logical and can be clearly quantified, it would be good to express those. After she's heard them out, they have nothing else left to do. This is not what anyone likes to hear under the circumstances - I am sure I would not either if M was my kid. As family we want to be completely happy about our kid's choice of partner.

I know of another young lady who is around M's age and is paralyzed with indecisiveness about her partner because she seeks full approval from her parents which has not been forthcoming. On the one hand she claims that such approval is not material to her decision to marry but on the other hand she is yet to marry. They have been together for years and in a state of suspended animation. In her case, the parents can feel vindicated that they have the decisive vote unlike my cousin's family with M. I am not sure which is the better option. As parents we can all dream of the stars magically aligning - our kid wanting to marry someone we love wholeheartedly and have no reservations about whatsoever. Very rarely does such dream come true. 

Big Promise

Reading this Wired story about IRS close to the tax filing deadline left me feeling breathless with fear of unknown unknows. Thirty days to create a Mega API in a hackathon that will essentially replace all current functionality is the the claim being made. 

The only way that is possible to drastically simplify the business logic. In this case expressed by byzantine maze of forms and schedules that are involved in filing taxes. It takes genius to know what applies when and why. If the rules were stupid simple then I can see this API being possible to deliver in the said amount of time. 

Absent that, it will end up being some cruel joke that will likely hurt some unknown set of taxpayers in unknowable ways. So the question is who all will unluckily and unwittingly fall into that bucket and how bad and ugly will it get for them. 

Conversely, what would it take to be in the other pile where all goes smoothly and well. We only have to wait until next year to find out assuming thirty days does not expand to thirty months and more as such things do more often than not.

There is this overarching presumption that disruption is good and effective no matter the reality of the situation at hand. One can hope that the hubris has some basis. 

Scenting Places

Nice essay about scents and places. When I come home after having been away for a while, I really savor the smell in the air when I walk in the door. There is a certain staleness in it, but it still carries in it the remnants of incense that I burn in the living room. That is the recognizable part of the "home" smell. There are other components that are not easily described but belong to this home. Reading this essay got me thinking if I would recognize my home by smell no matter where I was, if it was really that unique. Conversely, if that smell in some other place could make it home instantly. Maybe there is value in homing a fragrance first and taking it along in a travel diffuser. There is no universal smell of rain on dry earth - something I had never paid attention to before but will now

The airy scent that follows rain is known as petrichor, and there are many forms. The petrichor in Singapore, for example, will be quite different from that of Reykjavik. The desert smells most intensely after a sudden summer downpour, when the plants release their oils, when the soil opens its pores to the sky. Nevertheless, perfumers have identified a common essence to petrichor: the chemical compound geosmin. It takes its name from the Greek words for “earth” and “smell.” In small amounts—and we are able to detect very small amounts of geosmin, down to 10 parts per trillion, akin to a stick of incense diffused through the entire Empire State Building—it smells familiar and musty, a little minerally, a little dirty, but in a nice way. In larger doses, it can come across mildewy and rank, like dirty laundry left in a damp basement. In nature, geosmin is produced by certain species of blue-green algae that live within soil, and is part of the fragrance bouquet that gets released into the air before, during, and after the high desert gets hit by rain

Pausing Clock

I thought of my aging parents when I read this article and wondered if verbal fluency could be a skill they could retrain in 

The most striking result was that only verbal fluency—specifically, the ability to quickly list animals and words beginning with the letter “s”—predicted how long participants lived. People who performed better on these tasks tended to live longer, regardless of how they performed on other tasks like memory or vocabulary. The effect was sizable. On average, participants who could name many animals or words lived up to nine years longer than those who struggled with these tasks. To put it simply, naming more animals in 90 seconds was associated with living longer.

That would be an interesting to try and slow the clock by trying to improve the list making speed over time. Two words to begin and graduating to twenty or more in ninety seconds. I tried to recall a game I found useful when I got my first smartphone. It was meant to help with keeping your brain from slowing down. This was also the time in my life where I felt like I was on a single train of thought almost all the time - being mother to J. My brain was definitely missing a range of stimuli a person of my age would routinely get. I introduced a few other moms to it and they loved it too. While most had partners and were not pulling the weight of parenthood alone, everyone could relate to that one-track state of brain and the fear that there would not be much of it left on the other side of our kids' adulthood. I could not recall the game. 

In Harmony

Being sedentary is bad for you and will likely shorten your lifespan. I guess we all know this but the remedies proposed here are not that great. A doctor told me this a few years ago when I described my typical workday. She said all the benefits from my diet and fitness habits were being washed out by how long I sat in place. Her recommendation was to spread out the exercise throughout the day - not have a dedicated hour for it at the end of day but try to intersperse it throughout. This used to be a breeze when I worked from home unless meeting clients. That has changed a bit. It is no longer feasible to take a brisk walk, work in the yard, do a ten minute yoga routine when there was an opening between meetings.

I am sure it helped my physical health as the doctor said but the mental health benefits were remarkable as well. Those short breaks helped me feel better about the day no matter how it went. A good day felt great and a bad one not as much. It also left me with the sense of having more time for myself, ability to catch a breath often instead of running the whole time. My former co-worker S had a butterfly garden (she probably still does) and she took her lunch there if she was at home. According to S, it gave her life and work meaning that she was able to do this. She thought about how her paycheck had helped her plant this garden now home to so many beautiful butterflies. To her that was serving good cause. S came up with some of her best ideas over lunch in her favorite place. We need our equivalent of S's butterfly garden for our overall wellbeing in life.

Part Broken

This Atlantic essay warning us about the end of college as we know it, touches on a lot of reasons why this is imminent but does not spend enough time discussing the culpability of the institutions themselves in their potential upending

The college experience could very soon be one that bears little semblance to the classic picture. Your kid could end up on a campus with reduced student services and activities, aging rec centers, shrunken-down humanities departments, less prestigious faculty, and a class cohort that has been stripped of foreign students, and also thinned of anyone who happens not to be well-off. It could be a dreary and degraded version of the life at school that you may have once enjoyed yourself.

That process was well on its way before any of the recent developments the essay cites. The ROI of college education has been questioned for the longest time - it is hardly affordable and many may argue better options should exist for students who do not want to go the college route or wish to defer to a later date. 

Elsewhere in the world, colleges are not defined as mediators between childhood and adulthood. They may not be specific places where a student “goes” (as in the common formulation “I went to college”) but rather sets of nondescript buildings interwoven with cities. Only in America could “college” refer to the amalgamation of a coming-of-age experience and a credentialing service, based in a planned community that was mainly built to facilitate scientific research but also provides diversion, dining, and professional-quality sporting events.

That was the college experience generations of immigrant students coming to America to go to college have craved for. This was not something they could have in their home country. While it is indeed special and wonderful, the cost to deliver it to one and all has been unbearably high. Maybe the time has been ripe to rethink how some version of that unique experience can still be delivered in an affordable way and while not requiring every high school senior to participate in this coming of age experience to be successful in the world. 

Keeping Same

Did not realize there were so many use cases for the typewriter that are unrelated to nostalgia. This one sounds pretty obvious once explained but I would not have thought of it: 

a real estate agency called Jarvis Realty, owned and run by Woody Jarvis. "I'm real old school," he says. Jarvis, too, regularly uses a typewriter for office work. He gives the example of putting together an offer of purchase for a client. It'll start on the computer but he'll then print the document out and, should he need to make any modifications, he prefers to use correction fluid and his typewriter rather than re-printing the contract and wasting a lot of paper. "Our contracts are very legible and easy to understand," he says. He'll also occasionally type up a name and address on an envelope for a colleague. "For me, it works because I know how to make it all work."

There is something warm and reassuring to know that there is room in the modern world for typewriters and that will not change anytime soon. It's good to leave these places untouched by change they probably don't need or want

 ..why are businesses still using these things?"

But he has some good examples, including workers in warehouses who must continually process the transfer of goods by filling out forms. It's hard to feed these complex forms into a computer printer so that information gets printed onto them in exactly the right places. So, says Lundy, the warehouse workers prefer to insert the form into a typewriter and type it up by sight instead. 

Over Share

I never had any location sharing with J set up even when she was a teen and a novice driver. If she left somewhere while I was not home, the expectation was for her to text me upon departure from home and again upon arrival at location and the same on the way back. More often that not I would be back before she returned anyway.

Any further sharing seemed demeaning and I wanted there to be trust and not compliance by surveillance. I would always let J know where I was if not at home and by when I would be back. It felt like that was a reasonable standard for her as well. Once she moved out, such information sharing has stopped - we live too far apart for any of this to have meaning or value. Interesting reading about location sharing habits folks have grown up with it and how that transfers over in relationships

..many others who have grown up sharing their location with parents and friends, being on others’ radar screens—or maps, rather—seems perfectly normal. Location-sharing has also become common among married couples who find it helpful for timing dinner to a spouse’s ETA. For newly minted couples, though, the decision to share locations isn’t always easy.

Twenty-one percent of respondents to a surveyLife360 conducted last month of 1,000 app users who were dating or in a committed relationship said it’s a deal breaker if a potential partner isn’t willing to share their location. It’s even more critical for younger daters; of the approximately 150 Gen Z respondents, 30% said not sharing locations is a relationship killer. Almost 60% of participants said sharing locations signals the relationship is official.

Home Owner

We were out to lunch and one person in our group knew some folks at an other table that also had just the number of open seats we needed. So we joined them and I found myself seated next to a software developer whose just under seven years at his first and only job after college. We got chatting and I learned that he had recently become a homeowner and he was proud to share how expensive the home was and how close it was to his office. 

To be able to pay for that house, he had to absolutely keep the job he had. From his description of what he did, he is a commodity full stack developer undistinguishable from the legions of others just like him. He had lucked into a very good gig and thanks to the humungous mortgage was extremely motivated to keep his paycheck. He had made the conscious decision to get into a team in his company where the work was predictable and uncomplicated.

 Instead of worrying about being viable as a professional for a very long time, he focused on home buying as a priority, it was a point of pride for him and I had learned that fact about him in the first five minutes of our acquaintance. It made sense how he might see it as a very significant milestone when his generation has been struggling disproportionately with buying a home. I know some other folks who are around the same age as this guy and have yet to pull the trigger - not because they don't want to but because they are not able to make the same trade-offs. 

They want mobility and the ability to jump on opportunities when they present themselves - for professional growth or money or both. They would not stay with the same company for seven years trying to save for a home. If this guy had infact made the right bets he could be sitting in this forgotten corner of a very large company doing the most mundane, undemanding work every day with no big risk or reward. He would have a ten minute commute to work and live in a home that was his pride and joy. Who is to say that is not a great achievement for someone with his skills in this day and age. 

Missed Moments

M was a design consultant at the company where I worked a few years ago. He did a good job, got along with everyone and was well-liked. He had three kids all under 6 years old and they way he described the life he and his wife led, it seemed as if they worked as hard as they could to earn enough for child care of their three kids. The numbers were staggering even back then. They always wanted a second kid and ended up having twins and that had life altering consequences for M and his wife. Her job required her to travel for multiple weeks at a time but the pay was too good to pass up but not enough for M to stay at home. He picked contract work to have flexibility (and better money) but it came with a huge dose of uncertainty as well. 

The family was together some weekends and they made the most of it. M used to joke the unit of measure was 7 days for him as the days were a daze. He really got to spend some good quality time with his kids once a week. A lot could have changed from one Sunday to the next for each of them so it could be dizzying to keep up. 

He talked about the backlog of missed things, including conversations that were not had on time or until after the moment had passed. I met his wife once - a nice, somewhat frazzled woman, who can blame her. I remember thinking how strong a foundation it must take to keep this whole thing in balance. M and his wife had met in art school and spent a decade together before marriage. They both wanted to be in a stable and secure place before starting family - they were living some version of it, waiting for the tide to turn. 

While experts often consider housing as a family’s single largest expense, EPI found New Mexico’s annual infant care costs outpace rent by over 10%. Child care is out of reach for about 90% of New Mexico residents, according to the federal government’s definition of affordability, which is no more than 7% of a family’s income.

Famine Feast

It was spellbinding to see what the Hubble saw on birthdates of people who I care about. On my own it saw the Andromeda and on J's the Arches cluster. It was ironic that earlier that afternoon I found myself thinking about how J and I are so different that as adults the ties that bind us feel incredibly tenuous sometimes - Arches and Andromeda is so fitting. Maye that is the way it is meant to be between parent and adult child, asking for different is preparing for disappointment. Behind the thick tree-line in my backyard, is the driveway of our neighbors The K's. 

Sometimes when I am looking through the kitchen window, I see old Mr. K on his John Deere, his son (now in his thirties) with a leaf blower working in the yard. Sometimes they play pickleball on the driveway, the two sons and the parents. Mrs. K told me once that she has spent years waiting for the time her sons would finally take off. They are both married and had their first kids in the last couple of years but they rely on their parents as a source of support they can't seem to find anywhere else. Watching them from afar as I do sometimes, one would never tell there was any lack of harmony or that the Ks had not been on a vacation as a couple for a decade because their presence was almost always needed. Mr. K has been retired for over fifteen years and he has taken to beautifying the house with the vacation funds that have long gone unspent. 

As parents, The Ks and I are not all that different. We want the kids to be well and connected to us but none of us has the optimal degree of connection - one that feeds the soul just enough, no famine or feast. 

Chipped Nails

I feel a sense of gratitude when I have the time to be bothered by really minor annoyances. I arrive after a long and somewhat delayed flight at a hotel that is a block away from the office, a place I have stayed many times in the past. The best way to describe this establishment is - goofy. It would not the first choice for anyone's business trip but I took a shine to it. I like their minor quirks and how they can bring a mini fridge to my room if I say I'd like one. How its generally one welcome cookie for the trip but they look the other way if I get a couple of extra. The cookies are amazing and they don't look the part. A more discerning customer may completely avoid a cookie that looks so tacky but that is their overall vibe. Being here makes me feel at home and at ease. I can't imagine what better purpose a hotel can serve on a business trip.

As usual my freshly applied nail polish was chipped all over from moving luggage up and down so I had to take some time to touch it up before going to meet a young friend for dinner. She is going through some life changing experiences and only a few years older than J. I hope to learn from her about how to be the mother your adult child needs rather than be what you imagine you should or want to be. She is my sounding board as much as I am mine. She is totally fine that I need the extra time so I can fixed my chipped nail-polish. My any account my day had been remarkably without strife. All the aggravations if added up for the day would still amount to nothing. I have lived orders or magnitude stressful minutes and hours in my life. I like reflecting on how that had felt, remind myself that was within the realm of my reality so I can enjoy a day full of minor blemishes.

Techno Fossils

 In this Guardian article technofossil is a one word, but it feels like in need of two. There is a very high level of arrogance combined with uncertainty around technology these days. Once day all humans are going to displaced by AI and robots, the next day a contrary opinion about the AI will get dumb to the point of self-destruction because the average intelligence it depends on is getting lowered by the day. Between these wide swings, people in technology are getting by day to day. 

Some are much more concerned than others but such is always the case not matter what the issue at hand. But at no point is there talk of fossils we will create and perpetuate and how chicken bones and plastic grocery bags are not hitting the high notes for the persistent markers of a civilization. It may be quite fitting though that our collective hubris about so-called achievements dies a forgotten death and the all that remains are relics of our reckless and mindless consumer culture

Computer chips, though numerous, are tiny, and silicon is highly reactive with oxygen, making them unlikely to be significant as future fossils. But the wiring in electronic devices may well catch the eye, as the minerals that form from copper are bright and beautifully coloured, from azurite to malachite to bornite. Solar panels may also achieve immortality thanks to their distinctive shape and the sheer volume being produced.

Their exploration of future fossils has led Gabbott and Zalasiewicz to draw some conclusions. One is that understanding how human detritus could become fossils points towards how best to stop waste piling up in the environment.

“In the making of fossils, it’s the first few years, decades, centuries and millennia which are really crucial,” says Zalasiewicz. “This overlaps with the time in which we have the capacity to do something about it.”

Pine Needles

Once a year in spring I clean up the thick carpet of pine needles under the line of pine trees in my yard. They suffocate the earth until nothing but the most tenacious weeds can grow there. Cleaning the pine needles is hard work and at the end of many hours there is nothing much to see other than the ground being visible once again. I walk away tired and somewhat satisfied and the pine cones continue to fall, the trees have mostly greened by now. 

This annual ritual reminds of the changes that this part of my yard has gone through over the years and how each phase of its existence was deeply entwined with my own life's ebb and tide. J's middle school years left me with absolutely no discretionary time. There was a guy who cut the grass to keep the place from turning completely wild. Every once in a great while I would trim some bushes. The line of pine trees had been overcome by some invasive brush that grew furiously all around the trees, giving them no room to breathe.

High school was easier on my schedule because she drove and got to places on her own but mentally I was more preoccupied than ever - college and adulthood was looming in the horizon. Then there was college and learning to make sense of my empty nest, loss of purpose, struggling to make sense of the person that was once my child. That was when I started spending more time doing yardwork, growing herbs and the like. I imagine that is the rite of passage for many parents in that situation. Then she starts working and I see her very little of her - this is not something I had been prepared for but learn to take in stride. The pine trees get a new lease of life - the brush takes several months to clear but we get it done in the end. One year we collect a crop of wonderful wild mushrooms that grow under the pines.

It is hugely satisfying to see the before and after pictures of that line of trees but amusing to think how no one would notice or care - maybe the trees are happier and that counts. J has now moved to another city with a new job and we are much further apart than before - the pines needles have been cleaned regularly, the house is leftovers from times past, a place that has little practical relevance to our lives as it is now. But when I send J pictures of the lilies blooming in the yard, she is delighted. This is still home for her until she makes her own or so I imagine. 

Sleep Walking

Stealing time is one thing but money a bit different but there could be a logic to say that they are one and the same. What is interesting about the stories is that all the thievery is going on in the office not away working from home though showing up at noon could go one way or the other. While its easy and tempting to blame a whole generation as lazy, the real problem lies elsewhere. 

There are no competent or inspiring people managers or leaders of any sort that these young folks work for. So no surprise they feel no desire to perform at work. If a person was able to read 74 ebooks a year pretending they were reading their email, that person should not have been hired to begin because they have no measurable job to do. Every account in the article points to the same problem - one of over-hiring and not having a well-defined job where performance can be tangibly measured. That and no sense of team, shared vision, common purpose and the like.

These folks are sleep-walking through their careers (if its even worth calling that) trying to keep the paychecks coming so they can live whatever concept of life they want to live. The thinking is extremely tactical and the pace at which the world is changing does not appear to bother them at all. This is my own observation as well. People in the early stages of their career are often completely unconcerned about what would become of them professionally in 5-10 years, never mind longer. The rate of change we are experiencing is unprecedented and there is no playbook for most of it. When the internet happened, it was a big deal but having seen it, this feels a lot bigger and more pervasive. 

It would seem that folks who need to stay in the game for multiple decades would think long and hard about what it means for them and how they can best prepare for the future. Such is not the case for the vast majority - there is this great complacence that is fascinating to watch. I am much closer to the end of my career than the beginning and I find myself thinking all the time about what my professional future will be, what if any moat I have. Only people of my age bracket seem to think the way I do. The stealing of time and more appears to part of that same lack of concern about what the future holds