GRIZZLY PEAR

written snapshots

Category: Life

  • Nevada State College Cafe

    I was about half an hour early to a meeting so I ended up grabbing a coffee at the campus cafe and surveyed the setting.

    It was good to contemplate the users of my building. I needed to descend from the fog of bureaucracy and see the young women and men who will be using this building.

    The people in that shop will be graduated by the time my building opens up, but the next round of future teachers of Clark County will be following right behind them.

    And not long after, my daughter and then my son will be following behind them.

    My two little ones are closer in age to these young folks than I am.

    How time has flown.

  • A dream, glimpsed briefly

    Sometimes life will let you live your dreams.

    However, what you thought may be years, may only be weeks, or merely minutes.

    Life is both kind and cruel.

    And yet, if a taste is all you get, then savor it.

    After all, some dreams stay merely that.

  • A working relationship

    As a two architect household, we had a heck of a time making decisions for our own house remodel, especially since I’m a bang it out guy and she’s a bit more of a pump the brakes gal. It definitely made for some interesting “conversations”.

    Ultimately the exercise was a great crucible for the relationship, and I learned to completely trust her gut. Whenever she had the nagging vibe something wasn’t right — she was right. While it might take a while (and an unreasonable amount of effort) to come up with a better solution, the end result benefited from reevaluating the condition.

    That said the house remodel did drag out an ungodly amount of time, but we were living rent free with my in laws and I get along well with them and I think they liked having the girl around to keep them amused.

  • Whispers at the park

    The Clark County park system has program where one can purchase a memorial plaque at a tree.

    My girl has always been intrigued with these plaques, and she likes having them read out to her.

    To her it’s all so abstract, but when I get something near 1979, my eyes open up.

    They are reminders that life is short, and it runs quick.

    Go make the most of this time, it’s what we got. Nothing more is promised.

  • a good man who founded a good place

    Is there a better legacy one can leave behind?

  • Frisbee

    One of the local parks has a frisbee golf course so we brought one with us this latest visit.

    First, I most likely could use “better” frisbees. I remember the game store in Berkeley having a whole wall of different frisbees for aficionados of this hobby.

    Second, I have no idea if it made me any better, but I was constantly reminded of what I learned in Tai Chi. I tried to root my self in the ground and let the body relax, whipping around to initiate a wobbly sad flight trajectory.

    Third, my almost 40 year old body was pretty compliant while on site. But it only took the ride home for my left arm to decide that this sudden uptick in this particular repetitive action was traumatic enough to send alarm bells for the rest of the day.

    Finally, my daughter had a ball running up and down the hills chasing the frisbee and throwing it around.

    My last two decades in a nutshell, encapsulated in a plastic disc.

  • A good trade?

    Life is a series of tradeoffs.

    Usually the probem is not being willing to make any trades. We want it both. All.

    But the flip side is when we get caught up with the choices that are presented to us.

    I’ve only been to church once in the past few years, a talk at a local buddhist temple.

    The speaker spoke of the third way, finding other routes instead of just following the binary.

    So I guess it’s really a question of more than the tradeoffs at hand, but which ones to contemplate.

  • Colds

    The kids are sick.

    So is momma.

    They get to play.

    She still gotta work.

    Things calm down.

    Then another one comes home.

    Here we go again.

    What a winter.

  • A lovely morning

    My coworker offered to help with the review of one of my projects, which took the worst of the office pressure off my shoulders.

    As such, I was able to wake up yesterday and enjoy an ideal morning.

    It wasn’t much, but I got up took my time writing a post, surfed for a moment, exercised for a little bit (nothing too strenuous, just the ba duan jin followed by pushups). It was still quite early so I started up sorting through my papers.

    I have a massive “box of death” of random papers that all collect in that central location. Usually that box is cleared out via an epic organizing exercise that takes half a day.

    This time I just pulled a couple sheets at a time and filed them away. I didn’t go through many of them, but I still got a sense of accomplishment by the time I ate some steamed bread and went off to work.

    So nothing spectacular, but it was a lovely way to start my day, hitting my two main goals as well as one of my major auxiliary goals before going to the office.

  • All for Country

    In spite of what’s written on the state flag, Nevada’s official state motto is “All for Country”.

    Coincidentally, I’ve been practicing the Ba Duan Jin, which was invented by Marshall Yue Fei, who had a tattoo 盡忠報國 (jin zhong bao guo, utmost loyalty serve the country).

    Such devotion to the nation state is a foreign concept in this cynical age, and I’m wrapping my head around it. Being a patriot is good, and it’s certainly an awe inspiring motto (cue the marching bands and fighter jet flyovers), but I’m just not sold on it.

    However, if not that, then what is a better motto for oneself?