Today Diane, Gabe and I had to go to the hospital to get immunizations for our trip to India. 

Gabe helps me remember where we parked

It was the first time I’d been in the new FAHC building. In fact  it was the first time I’d been in a hospital since Sam’s passing. It was hard being there  for me.. really hard.  We had planned an hour for this meeting, but it took twice that, We met with a cool doctor that told us more than we would ever want to know about types of bugs, germs, fungi and parasites that we’re going to be traveling with us on this trip.   It’s a wonder anyone goes anywhere give what we heard.  We were offered a menu of  immunizations . The doc was not allowed to tell us what to do.. only lay out the options. It felt like a combination of game show and some sort of twisted restaurant.  I ordered ala cart.. I chose the Hepatitis A and the DPT injection.. I ordered it intramuscular.. just the way I like it. I had oral Typhus for desert. Gabe and Diane ordered light.. they both opted just for the Hepatitis A.

 Gabe tries to hide

In the consulting room

Dinae is brave

Gabe is brave

John’s a chicken

other arm

all done

and here’s dessert

You know the whole thing had two   parallels  for me.  OK.. first the hard one.  I had been walking around for 4 days knowing that I was going to get at least one shot today..  I woke up for  the last few days knowing that I was going to have something unpleasant and painful today.. Just like now.. I wake every morning knowing that I am going to go around missing Sam.. feeling that pain.   Sometimes really bad..  It’s a very hard way to live.. On the other hand.. the event itself, the shot.. did not hurt like I had imagined. The anticipation of it hurting was so much worse than the actual event. Again another parallel.. my anticipation of how bad I think I’m going to feel in the future.. especially on certain days like birthdays… never seems to be as bad as I expect…OK.. not too deep.. but it’s  the kind of analysis I can’t seem to help doing every moment of every day.

 

One cool thing that happened through the day is I kept getting notes from folks who were in the audience at the talk I gave in Cambridge yesterday. Folks were writing to thank me for being honest about the work life balance question when I talked about Sam’s death Several of them told me about their own  stories which were cool to hear.

 

Speaking of stories… We got some word from our friends Mason, Rusty, Tyler and Alex  traveling in Europe.. Here’s a note we got from Tyler‘s mom Gretchen..

 

 

> HI Diane,

>

> The boys are in London at a State Radio concert as I write.  I also just

> met the new neighbors who moved in across the street.  The young woman I

> met is a friend of Chad‘s from ….State Radio.  (Another coincidence in

> life.) This woman grew up with Chad, they played together alot as little

> kdis.

>

> Tyler called yesterday. They are all doing well.  They seem to be having a

> grand time.  I guess Alex walker (Mowalka)  and Tyler took a walk around

> London at 10pm on sunday night.  He said they walked around for 2 hours.

> I don’t know if it was during his night walk or during the day, but they

> went by Big Ben and the parliament.  Tyler did mention things are expensive

> over there.  They were getting ready to have their first “real meal” since

> landing in Dublin.  I guess bread and cheese have been sustaining them.

> They went to the market and bought food to cook AND wine to drink.  It is

> my understanding it doesn’t cost much more than the bottled water.

>

> Tomorrow at 5 am they have to be at the train station to board for the

> trip to Amsterdam.  They take a train to Harwich, then a 6 hour ferry

> ride, then another train up to Amsterdam where Marshall‘s niece lives.

> Lisa said they’ve already stocked the frig for the boys.  Lisa is the one

> getting married in a month in Italy.  We will meet the boys there.

>

> Namaste,.  Gretchen

>

>

 

 

It’s fun to track their travels.. My travels are now taking me to bed.. More tomorrow !

Nite all.. nite Sam

 

-me

 

11PM and just home from an 800 mile loop that included Brooklyn, Armonk, and Cambridge. At one level I really enjoy trips like this. I really love all the quiet uninterrupted personal time while driving. At the same time I miss my family like crazy when I’m away. I’m really going t be ratcheting back on travel when I take this new temporary assignment in November.

 

Today was fun and productive. It started at Ruchir and Rashi’s.. As always, those guys were amazing hosts. By the time I got down for breakfast this morning, Rashi was already cooking breakfast… today it was delicious pancakes made of fermented rice and lentils mixed with onion and peppers. It was so tasty..

After a  quick breakfast, I got on the road for Cambridge. I was on work calls in route all the way. Phone calls make the miles really melt away.  It seemed like the 3 hour drive took about 20 minutes.

 I get these messages every time I drive

I got to Cambridge around noon,  jus tin time to be able to help host one of the lunch tables at the seminar I was speaking at. This is one of my favorite aspects of my job.. the ability to sit down and talk to large groups of new, smart and motivated people all the  time. These folks were  about 150  mid career ‘high potential’ technical employees from our software, services and research organizations. I learned so much by talking to them.

After lunch I had a bunch of day job stuff to do.. Around 2:30 I wondered down to give my talk on technical career development. Like always, I was so nervous before the talk.. I was having trouble getting myself jazzed to give a fun and inspiring talk… ‘fun’ is hard to do on demand.. and given how low I’ve been feeling lately.. I was worried.. Somehow, though.. when they told me to start talking.. I started having fun.. and the talk went pretty well.  One interesting observation from this group is that most of them have change jobs several times even though they’ve only been around for 10 years or so. I told them that I was a poor role model for them because I’m basically in the same job  I was hired into in 1981.   Maybe that why  taking this  new rotational assignment feels like such a big deal to me.,

 

After my talk I moderated a career panel which had  4 senior technical folks from different  organizations.

It was great getting these folks perspective on career dos and don’ts. I got much out of listening to them..   One of the questions we got as a panel was about work-life balance.. The women asked if we had made many life compromises to advance in the company.. The panel had some great comments on that… Then I added my story about Sam’s passing. I told them that I had done a bunch of questioning  over the last 10 months about work-life issues. Had I worked to hard ? too much ? to intensely.. I admitted that even though I’ve still had lots of fun, I think I’ve worried too much about work stuff over the past  26 year.  I also know that Sam’s passing has really fundamentally changed the way I view my priorities. Talking about it got me pretty choked up.. but I got my thoughts out.  I knew I had to talk about Sam in that forum.. yet I was also worried  about the  effect that story might have on the crowd. The response was actually wonderful. I had some many folks come up and talk to me about Sam after the talk. It made me happy that I’d responded to the panel question from my heart. 

 

The panel was over a bit after 4… It was 4:30 by the time I got out of there. I had a 5-6 meeting I had to pre for .. so I fund a spare office and got to work… After my meeting I grabbed a quick byte in the  Cambridge Mall food court. This was the same place that Sam and I had eaten when we were down here 4 years ago on a field trip..  

I then found my car and started heading north. There was a beautiful moon rising and the traffic was light.

It was a great evening for driving.    My one disappointment was that I was too late to catch  Hooksett Fireworks.. (though I had a nice phone call with the great lady that owns the place)..

 

Now that I’m home I’m really, really tired.. Time for bed..   I walked upstaris and found that soemone  had booby trapped the stairs with a taling skeleton.. (Gabe ?!?)

Talk to you all tomorrow

 

-‘Nite all.. ‘Nite Sam.

 

-me

 

 

Greetings from Somers NY. I spent the day at IBM Headquarters trying to jungle too many things. My day got off to a strange start when I realized that the only footwear I had with me was my Birkenstocks.. It s pretty typical of the lapses in mindfulness  that I find my self making all the time now. I was thinking that I would look pretty snazzy with my slacks and sport coat and sandals.. I was about to go into my meeting when I realized that my real shoes were in a separate bag  in the car..  One embarrassment avoided…

 

This morning I attended a conference for new-ish employees.. I say new-ish because thaty all had somewhere between 0 and 10 years of service. There were some  good kick off  talks including ones from My bosses boss.. and my friend Kerrie from Ca.   I co-lead a panel on patents and IP.. It went well enough.. not great.. but lots of questions and a few laughs.

Me in the IBM Learning Cneter Cafeteria

I spent the afternoon bouncing back and forth between day-job meetings and some early ramp up on my rotational assignment.  I met with my buddy Tim-from-Texas about a video project that we’re planning on doing. He’s going to be really fun to work with. I also met with the outreach team.  I really like  the folks I’m going to be working with.

Friends Nora, Eric and Grace

I’m also  starting to get a better idea of what I’ll be able to do for them. I’m nervous and excited about the new challenge.. I guess you’ll all follow me on that journey.. again.. I plan to transition at the beginning of Nov.

 

My day job meetings ran until about 7… I grabbed a quick snack with my friend Jeff from Minnesota who was in for the same early tenure conference.. then I headed out to Ruchir and Rashi’s

 

I got here about 8:30 . I’d been feeling so blue all day.. (Big Blue !)..   Ruchir gave me a big hug when I walked in the door and that made me realize that that was what I’d been needing all day. It feels like a home away from home here.

 

The two kids, Isha(7) and Anika (nearly 3) were sitting at the table ready to eat. Rashi was making fresh pratha it smelled, looked  and tasted wonderful as usual.    We had lotus bean curry, dahl , pratha, potato broccoli curry ,and  fresh mint/coriander chutney .. What’s more they had some really good hot mango and lime pickle.. Even the though of that makes my mouth water

 Yumm !

After A nice leisurely dinner.. I goofed around with the kids.. we read some books, played with my glasses.. and took these  flattering portraits. 

 Isha in my glasses

Anika trys them on too

Ooop.. It’s late again.. I have an early day tomorrow.. so I’ll end here..

 

Subha ratri (good night)  everyone . Subha ratri Sam

 

-me

 ps. Gabe just posted this awsome cork 720 form me.. Check this out

 

Today was Yom Kippur and I spent it quietly here at home. I decided not to go to shul (temple) . Last night and last week were fine.. but I felt better about being by myself. I did do the traditional Fast from last night. The idea of the fast is to clear you mind of worldly things. So you can concentrate on more spiritual things… like how hungry you are. I’ve fasted every Yom Kippur since I was little.. but I never remember it being as easy as today. I’ve really no been eating that much the last month or so anyway.. I usually get pretty light headed, spacey and cranky after about 4 hours without food.. today I barely felt it. I think I know have such a different scale of pain that this didn’t even register. I guess that’s a good thing…

 

Not much else really happened today… Gabe and his friends hd camped out on the tramp.. again.. I think they got pretty wet from the dew.. but they slept late enough that the sun dried them before they woke. 

Gabe got out the spray cans again and ended up being the boy with the golden toe.

 
 

Around 4ish Diane and I took a short walk.. As we were coming back to the house, we saw Gabe and a bunch of kids coming down the road towards us. From the that distance it was hard to tell that Sam wasn’t with them. It’s kind of nice when that happens.

 

Around 7 a bunch of friends came over to help us replenish the SamStones stock. We move through them so quickly now. Check out the SamStones.Org map to see the large number of Stones getting out there.. Jen estimates we’re over 2000.  I get many  notes of them being placed and/or found every day now.

 

A picture Avery had that Sam gave to her

As folks started to disperse tonight, a few of us started watching an amazing thing on YouTube. All this week I’d heard of a moving ‘Last Lecture’ which was given last week by Prof. Randy Paush a 46 year old professor at Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) where I did my grad work. Randy is a pioneer in Virtual Reality and is the creator of Alice.. the game authoring tool used by many universities including my buddies Anne and Hpe’s program at Champlain. Randy’s been diagnosed with an advanced and  incurable form of pancreatic cancer. Evidently he has only a few weeks left to live. / He chose to give one last university lecture on ‘Achieving your dreams’ . I’ve received 6 emails from friends with links to videos of the lecture. It was covered in the Wall Street Journal. SlashDot, ComputerWorld. The CMU press. Etc. I found the lectures on YouTube   During the hour, Randy talks about growing u. his parents, his mentors and his students and his work. I was interested  in the latter  because Randy’s been a pioneer in the use of gaming and virtual world technology for education.. which is the field I’m entering for my sabbatical. He has some great observations on making your dreams come true. I found it really inspirational.. and one of the most amazing examples of grace under pressure I’ve seen . It’s really worth watching if you have the time..

 

Here’s an edited version of the highlights of the talk.

 

 

 

Here are the links to the unedited segments on YouTube.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HqdnjgkExY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n_5cTuXrpNI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PYIAbIlQ8o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J18CnoQbizA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BC-v8A2_biM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhHNBqm8xtE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z8azl1hqUaM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_VcjTG4xh4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V5H5R2hC45o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnD7i9XHL7k

 

OK.. Now time to sleep. I’m leaving early tomorrow to go down and see Max.. I’ll report more from down there.

 

Goodnight all. Goodnight Sam

-me