Wednesday night – old friends

April 28, 2011 johncohn 1 Comment

Greetings from Rochester Vermont.. A town I used to visit often.. but one I haven’t visited in about 5 years.

I left Mary and John’s house about 6L15 this morning.. and only got there about 10 PM last night.. Their kids were all in bed .. I had to look at them as they slept. I was sadly that I hadn’t worked out a way to spend more time with everyone.. I did have a great time talking with John and Mary until way too late at night..

The drive down from MPLS to Rochester was pretty easy.. I got to the IBM site about 8. I spent the day doing talks and roundtables among lots of old friends.. It was both scary and comforting to have to present in front of all these familiar faces.. Some of these folks are the first group of people I worked with back in 1981.. While we all have changed externally.. internally I feel the same strong bond to these folks that I had nearly 3 decades before.. I still even remember some of their phone numbers !

It was a really energizing day.. I saw so much energy and innovation.. Much more than I’ve seen anywhere for a very long time. I think the good folks in Rochester have a great balance between ego and ability.. They’re so damn smart.. and so damn nice that they’re close to teh perfect set of collaborators

After work we all headed to Whistle Binkey’s .. a bar I’ve been coming to for years. It was a great time to catch up with lots of old friends.. I never have enough time to catch up with folks enough on these short visits.. .. Even so.. It’s so nice to get to see them.

Now I’m at feibd Karen ad Jeffs.. strugglign to stay awake to write.. I better sign off here before I stop makign sense..

too late !

nite all, nite sam

-me

Tuesday night – my day

April 26, 2011 johncohn Leave a comment

I was going to title this post ‘not my day’.. but then thought better of it.. it is my day.. and I need to own it.. As I wrote last night.. I find I’m struggling again with resilience.. I am finding the boundary I try to maintain with how my job is going and my sense of self has been harder to maintain these past couple of weeks.. Diane and I were talking about it this morning.. We were noticing how all of us were still very much reliving dylan’s passing.. .. and even though we .. like many of dylans friends, are back out in the world world.. we’re still not normal.. far from it.. I’m remembering the need to be gentle with ourselves as we settle in to our modified reality.

That conversation helped me get my head around my reactions today.. and the world has given me ample tests otoday.. I had a very tough meeting this morning, I was not able to get the eariler flight I wanted in order to see my sister and her family, I got the royal (20 minute) pat down when I went through security (they didn’t like the homemade electronics I was carrying).. and subsequently missed my plane.. …but.. I can still make my connection

.. and somehow I’m still smiling..

and was able to appreciate thhat the guy sitting next to me had the same duct tape on his computer…

life is hard, full and rich.. .. isn’t it…?

love you all, love you sam

-me

Monday night – resiliance

April 25, 2011 johncohn Leave a comment

Strong monday vibe today.. spent my evening last night getting churned up about how things were going at work.. then spent all of today worrying about how something tomorrow is going to go. I got the feeling that work tomorrow will be tough.. andI let htat ruin most of tdoay..

Isn’t it funny that an imagined outcome of later can interfere with my Now.. especially wwhen my nows can be so challenging…

Something for me to think about

nite all, nite sam

-me

Sunday night – Easter

April 24, 2011 johncohn Leave a comment

Happy Easter folks .. It was a good day.. Like all holidays..there’s a streak of sadness for missing Sam.. We lit Sam’s lantern.. then got right into the candy..

As we did.. I read one of my favorite stories about Easter out loud to the kids.. It’s called The Rabbit of Easter by David Sedaris.. a bit sacrilegious.. but that’s why I like it..

The bunny.. or the bell.. depends on your tradition according to sedaris.. left stuff for gabe, ian and matt.. .. a basket.. and a bunch of eggs..

The hunt was wild and fast.. soon all the eggs were collected.

There were a few surprises.. in addition to the normal candy.. that waskaly wabbit had also thrown in some broccoli. (now who would have done something like that ? )