As some of you already remembered, David had his second birthday
recently. We were fortunate enough to rent out the MyGym by our house
where David goes to class once a week. It’s his favorite place on earth.
The birthday was wonderful and David had a blast. This particular photo
is my favorite photo of David from the day. It might even be one of my
all-time favorites. I tried to explain it to Jake multiple times but I
can’t put it into proper words. To me, if you opened the dictionary to
the word bliss, this would be the photo next to it.
Here’s another photo from the beautiful drive Jake, David and I took a
few months ago. Quite breathless.
When we first moved here, Jake and I drove up to Skyline Drive early in
the morning and I snapped some photos. They’ve been sitting in the drive
for weeks (months actually) so I thought this would be a good time to
post a few.
We
Are All Welcome Here is Elizabeth Berg’s newest novel. (There’s a
newer one coming out in May.) I am a huge fan of hers and was thrilled
to find this book at the library. To be honest, it wasn’t a favorite of
mine. While I thought the story was beautiful and touching, it wasn’t as
strong as many of her others. Berg has a distinct skill of writing about
women and not making it cheesy or fluffy.
Three little books from Anna Quindlen, another powerful and strong
female author: Peing
Perfect, How
Reading Changed My Life and A
short Guide to a Happy Life. I was interested in all of these books
but didn’t want to pay the list price for such a small book that I knew
would be an hour read.
Thanks to the Palo Alto Library, I finally got my
hands on them and was able to read the lovely little stories which
really should have been essays and not books of their own. To be fair,
the reading book did recommend many awesome books to me that I love.
And finally I just finished Anna Quindlen’s latest book, Rise
and Shine. Since the story was about two sisters and took place in
New York, I really looked forward to reading it. Quindlen is a fantastic
author so, of course, the book wasn’t bad. However, it wasn’t great
either. I felt that she has done and could have done a lot better. The
characters were just not three-dimensional enough. 
I didn’t feel
sympathetic towards either of the sisters and felt like some of the
major plot points were either implausible or unnecessarily dramatic. I had a pretty hard time getting into the story and I kept waiting for it to get more interesting and for something to happen. And when it finally did, I compeltely didn’t believe it. It felt like a cop-out. However, when I got to the end of the book, the last two lines spoke to the core of the story and made me remember why I love her so much.
Another fantastic female author and one of my very favorites is Jane
Smiley. And I am delighted that I’ll be getting to hear her talk this
week (cross fingers). Now I need a new book by Anne Tyler and I will be
all set.
I am a huge fan of Paulo Coelho. I have read most of his novels and
found every one of them to be thought provoking and un-putdownable. And
The
Devil and Miss Prym was no exception. I read the entire novel in a
day and loved every moment of it. This one is an interesting study of
human morality. Or lack thereof. Books with this topic always make me
think of Lord of the Flies which I think is the ultimate story of human
nature.
Playing the part of a charitable soul was only for those who were afraid
of taking a stand in life. It is always far easier to have faith in your
own goodness than to confront others and fight for your rights. It is
always easier to hear an insult and not retaliate than have the courage
to fight back against someone stronger than yourself; we can always say
we’re not hurt by the stones others throw at us, and it’s only at night
– when we’re alone and our wife our husband or our school friend is
asleep – that we can silently grieve over our own cowardice.
…
Not a single voice in the crowd was raised against the choice. The mayor
was glad because they had accepted his authority; but the priest knew
that this could be a good or a bad sign, because silence does not always
mean consent – usually all it meant was that people were incapable of
coming up with an immediate response. If someone did not agree, they
would later torture themselves with the idea that they had accepted
without really wanting to, and the consequences of that would be grave.
There’s something about Paulo Coelho that I completely connect with and
I cannot describe in words.
I can’t even remember where I read about Paradox of Choice. All in all, it wasn’t the most interesting book I read. I
flipped through a lot of the pages but did read many passages with a
lot of interesting thoughts. There are a lot of passages from this one
and honestly each deserve their own posts, but I figure let’s document
this first, I can always come back to them.
Participants in a laboratory study were asked to listen to a pair of
very loud, unpleasant noises played through headphones. One noise lasted
for eight seconds. The other lasted sixteen. The first eighteen seconds
of second noise were identical to the first noise, whereas the second
eight seconds, while still loud and unpleasant, were not as
loud. Later, the participants, were told that they would have to listen
to one of the noises again, but that they could choose which one.
Clearly, the second to be repeated. Why? Because whereas both noises
were unpleasant and had the same aversive peak, the second had a less
unpleasant end, and so was remembered as less annoying than the first.
…
When asked about what they regret the most in the last six months,
people tend to identify actions that didn’t meet expectations. But when
asked about what they regret the most when they look back on their lives
as a whole, people tend to identify failures to act. In the short run,
we regret a bad educational choice, whereas in the long run, we regret a
missed educational opportunity. In the short run, we regret a broken
romance, whereas in the long run, we regret a missed romantic
opportunity. So it seems that we don’t close the psychological door on
decisions we’ve made, and as time passes, what we’ve failed to do looms
larger and larger.
…
The fundamental significance of having control was highlighted in a
study of three-month-old infants done more than thirty years ago.
Infants in one group – those who had control – were placed in a faceup
in an ordinary crib with their heads on a pillow. Mounted on the crib
was a translucent umbrella, with figures of various animals dangling
from the springs inside. These figures were not visible to the infants,
but if the infants turned their heads on the pillows, a small light
would go on behind the umbrella, making the “dancing” figures visible
for a little while. Then the light would go off. When the infants did
turn their heads, just by chance, and turned on the light and saw the
dancing figures, hey showed interest, delight, and excitement. They
quickly learned to keep the figures visible by turning their heads, and
they kept on doing so, again and again. They also continued to show
delight at the visual spectacle. Other infants in the study got a “free
ride.” Whenever a “control” infant turned on the light behind the
umbrella in its crib, that action also turned on the light behind
the umbrella in the crib of another infant. So these other infants got
to see the dancing figures just as often and for just as long as their
controlling partners did. Initially, these infants showed just as much
delight in the dancing figures. But their interest quickly waned. They
adapted.
…
People do differ in the types of predispositions they display.
“Optimists” explain success with chronic, global, and personal causes
and failures with transient, specific, and universal ones. “Pessimists”
do the reverse. Optimists say things like “I got an A” and “She gave me
a C.” Pessimists say things like “I got a C” and “He gave me an A.” And
it is the pessimists who are candidates for depression. When these
predispositions are assessed in people who are not depressed, the
predispositions predict who will become depressed when failures occur.
People who find chronic causes for failure expect failures to persist:
those who find transient causes don’t. People who find global causes for
failure expect failure to follow them into every area of life; those who
find specific causes don’t. And people who find personal causes for
failure suffer large losses in self-esteem; those who find universal
causes don’t.
…
I think the power of nonreversible decisions comes through most clearly
when we think abut our most important choices. A friend once told me how
his minister had shocked the congregation with a sermon on marriage in
which he said flatly that, yes, the grass is always greener. What
he meant was that, inevitably, you will encounter people who are
younger, better looking, funnier, smarter, or seemingly more
understanding and empathetic than your wife or husband. But finding a
life partner is not a matter of comparison shopping and “trading up.”
The only way to find happiness and stability in the presence of
seemingly attractive and tempting options is to say, “I’m simply not
going there. I’ve made my decision about a life partner, so this
person’s empathy or that person’s good looks really have nothing to do
with me. I’m not in the market – end of story.” Agonizing over whether
your love is “the real thing” or your sexual relationship above or below
par, and wondering whether you could have done better is a prescription
for misery, Knowing that you’ve made a choice that you will not reverse
allows you to pour your energy into improving the relationship that you
have rather than consistently second-guessing it.
…
As the number of choices we face increases, freedom of choice eventually
becomes a tryanny of choice. Routine decisions take so much time and
attention that it becomes difficult to get through the day. In
circumstances like this, we should learn to view limits on the
possibilities we face as liberating not constraining. Society provides
rules, standards, and norms for making choices, and individual
experience creates habits. By deciding to follow a rule (for example,
always wear a seat belt; never drink more than two glasses of wine in
one evening), we avoid having to make a deliberate decision again and
again. This kind of rule-following frees up time and attention that can
be devoted to thinking about choices and decisions to which rules don’t
apply.
Lots of food for thought.
Ok, so I am not doing so great on the “post more” resolution. But I am
working on it, I promise.
I’ve also read a bunch lately. I wanted to start with something easy so
I grabbed
Good
Grief which has been sitting on my shelf for several months. It was
as chick-litty as it looks but at least not superficial like some of the
other stuff out there so it was a good combination of easy reading but
not too unlikeable.
Then I moved on to The
Lovely Bones which I have purposely been putting off for years. I
hadn’t been prepared for the raw horror of it. And I knew it was a great
book but didn’t think I wanted to read it. So I finally did and it was
horrible. The book was very well written and I read it in one gulp.
However the story itself was as bone-chilling as I worried it would be
and I got as affected as I thought I would be. So much so that I had to
watch some really silly TV before I’d sleep at night so as to not go to
bed with the book in my mind. I know Alice Sebold has another great book
but until she stops writing about rape, I am not reading another one of
her stories.
Then I moved to my very trusted source of AskMe and as usual, they
didn’t let me down. I started with the recommendation of Christoper
Moore and the Palo Alto library had
A
Dirty Job
available immediately so I started with that. And I loved it. I
swallowed the whole book in a day! I loved the subject matter. I loved
his writing style. It was hilarious and I generally am not known for my
sense of humor! I have since checked out another Moore book and let’s
see if he’s consistent.
I have also checked out 32 other books that I am supposedly going to
read in the next three weeks. I figure if I read another three that will
be major progress.
“Isn’t that why you quit working at Goldman?”
Asks my innocent father when I tell him how busy my life has been with
work.
It is and it isn’t.
It has now been four months since I’ve started working at Google. Life’s
been hectic to say the least. However, it’s not the same kind of hectic
I had at my previous jobs. It’s tiring and at times overwhelming like
the other jobs were. But it’s also invigorating and exciting and
interesting and challenging. Basically, it meets all the criteria I had
when I was looking for a job. And then some…
So the last few months have been busy. When I’m not working or tired
from working, I generally try to hang out with David and Jake. I think
about writing often, but don’t actually get around to doing it. As is
the case with every year-end, I decided last week that writing more
often would be good for me. Taking photos more often would be good for
me. And reading more would be good for me. So I plan to do more of all
three. If you don’t see me writing for three consecutive days, feel free
to harass me.
All this ambition could be fueled by the almost ten days of
relatively lull activity that is sure to end within 24 hours but I am
still going to give it my best.
I have taken a ton of photos of David and some of Palo Alto. I have read
two books and making good progress on a third. I have even scrapbooked a
few pages. All in the last ten days. Let’s see how the next ten days work.
More to come later.
Another pre-work book I read was Now Discover Your Strengths. Recommended by many and an interesting read. Especially in this way:
This fixation with weakness is deeply rooted in out education and upbringing. We presented parents with this scenario: Say your child returns home with the following grades: and A in English, an A in social studies, a C in biology, and and F in algebra. Which of these grades would you spend the most time discussing with your son or daughter? Seventy-seven percent of parents chose to focus on the F in algebra, only 6 percent on the A in English, and an even more minuscule number, 1 percent, on the A in social studies. Obviously, the algebras grade requires some attention because to progress in school and secure a place at a college or university the child cannot to fail a subject. But the question was phrased carefully: Which of these grades would you spend the most time discussing with your son or daughter? Despite the demands of today’s education system, does the most time really deserve to be invested in the child’s weakness?
It’s quite amazing but totally accurate that we tend to concantrate on our weaknesses and how to make them better instead of using our strengths to circumvent the weaker areas.
Here are a few more I’ve read since I last posted:
Recommended by a friend: Paypal Wars was a very badly written but really interesting read. Quite interesting to see how many times they came close to closing up shop and how many stupid business decisions were made and how strongly they depended on paypal.
And, of course, The Long Tail. Interesting and thought-provoking read and worthwhile for anyone who doesn’t understand the difference between online and offline retail and the potential in both. There are many, many people in the world and their tastes and interests vary drastically.
So there are a few drafts I had left in my inbox before I started working at Google. I am going to try to post those (all have to do with books) first. I found out about Not Fade Away in someone’s blog and decided to pick it up. I read the whole book in one day and enjoyed it very much. Here are a few quotes that really spoke to me:
And this, unfortunately, brings me to one of the most excruciating incidents of my childhood – one of those awful moments, totally trivial in itself, that you literally spent your whole life getting over. I tell this story as a plea to parents, coaches, teachers: For God’s sake, be careful what you say when a child messes up!
This is one of my biggest pet-peeves. Parents who speak without thinking, parents who think their children have the same sensitivity level they have. Parents who scar you forever.
It would have been easy to finish that degree – easier than bolting. With the degree in hand, it would have been easier for me to land a job with one of the status quo watchdogs that with anybody else. Once I had the job, it would have been easier to amend my own beliefs that to change the organization.
Thus, by increments so exquisitely gradual that they might have just passed unnoticed, I could have ended up being totally untrue to myself and living a life I hated. Twenty years later, I might have had a closet full of suits, a passport full of visas, and and irreparable feeling that I’d really blown it.
Another beautifully poignant point. It’s sad and amazing how quickly and quietly we lose control of our lives. How we wake up suddenly, years later, and we can’t remember why we are where we are and how we got there. How easy it is to take the next easy step without thinking why and whether it’s still a step on your eventual destination (assuming you still remember your eventual destination.)
It’s funny, in a way – our society warns us about the temptations of wealth and power, about the slender chances of a rich man getting into Heaven. But poverty has its pitfalls, too. Too little dough can erode a person’s ethics and values just as easily as too much.
We spent our last three nights in Istanbul, at the Bebek Hotel. Even
though it was unbearably hot, we took frequent walks and I kept wanting
to take snapshots of this amazing door. I finally remembered to bring my
camera and took this photo and another.
Alice is the nanny of one of my childhood friends. It’s been over 12
years since I last saw her, so as soon as I did, I snapped this shot.
You can see some of my other portraits from the Istanbul trip here.
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