My new guitar!!!!!!!!

The Fender Stratocaster.....a dream guitar!

Sleeping with Others

A beautiful poem by Stephen Dunn, Pulitzer Prize winner, 2001.

Sleeping With Others

Because memory and its intrusive nostalgias
lie down with us,
it helps to say we love each other,

each declaration a small erasure, the past
for a while reduced to a trace,
the heart's palimpsest to a murmur.

Still, our solitudes are so populated
that sometimes after sex
we know it's best to be quiet -

time having instructed us in the art
of the unspoken,
of in the sufficient eloquence

of certain sighs. Regret shows up
unpredictably,
sleeping with, but never between us.

Like joy it doesn't stay long, quickly tiring
of the language
used in its name, wanting only itself.

We've made this bed. We're old enough
to know sorrow may visit
now and then, and that the world slides in

at will - ugly, dark, confident it belongs.
Nothing to do but let it
touch us, allow it to hurt, and remind

'Meaning'

Dean Harker at S's graduation at Wharton gave a beautiful speech on the role of business leaders in today's environment. Quite a contrast from Laxmi Mittal who spoke thereafter on a long, pain-stakingly detailed account of the Mittal-Arcelor deal.

An excerpt of the speech is as below:

John Gardner, a great academic and civic leader, said this about meaning:

“Meaning is not something you stumble across, like the answer to a riddle or the prize in a treasure hunt. Meaning is something you build into your life.

“You build it out of your own past, out of your affections and loyalties, out of the experience of humankind as it is passed on to you, out of your own talent and understanding, out of the things you believe in, out of the things and people you love, out of the values for which you are willing to sacrifice something.

“The ingredients are there. You are the only one who can put them together into that unique pattern that will be your life. Let it be a life that has dignity and meaning for you. If it does, then the particular balance of success or failure – as the world measures success or failure – is of less account.”

On a separate note :-) , started playing the guitar. Will put up pictures over the weekend.

Parting

My life closed twice before its close;
It yet remains to see
If Immortality unveil
A third event to me

So huge, so hopeless to conceive,
As these that twice befell.
Parting is all we know of heaven,
And all we need of hell.

- Emily Dickinson

Motivation and beyond..

Have finally joined a painting class. My first professional training ever in oil-painting. It looks like a large commitment in terms of time (every sat 10-5pm for 10 Saturdays) – given the insanity of time pressure on the weekdays (Ah! The pitfalls of an investment banking job), weekends are crucial to numb down the high frequency pitch of the mind and indulge in a contrasted world of calmness, utter solitude and peace. Fitting this routine on weekends is going to require a certain amount of rigour and commitment to the art – I hope I am able to live it out.

First class was satisfying. The studio is large with big windows and as spring has now set in, there is lot of sunlight through the day. Alison (www.harperart.com) has a beautiful mind – it is wonderful to finally meet someone in flesh and blood who shares this deep love and passion for the art. I did a still life of three peppers in complementary colors for this class - will put it up next week once I get the painting back home. I learnt about color toning and also did a painting for the first time without turps. It was not easy to do the detailing without a paint thinner but not as hard as I imagined either. Loved the overall tone and texture of the painting eventually. Alison made me do a canvas wash in acrylic in a complementary color of the actual background before I began the painting. I had never experimented with acrylics and oils together on canvas before - loved the overall warm feel and the painting really started coming together due to that wash. Also learnt to avoid too much detailing in the beginning but to work on all parts of a painting parallely and get into levels of detailing for the painting as a whole (this was initially anti intuitive to me – need to unlearn quite a bit and consiously control instincts to get it right). For the next class, I need to do a black and white painting.

Also joined an online guitar class recommended by F, www.nextlevelguitar.com . The teacher, Dave seems to have a very simplistic approach to guitar learning and has taken the fear out of my mind. He makes it a lot of fun. The last time I tried learning to play a guitar (on IIMA campus), it was a disaster - mostly due to a combination of lack of practise as a result of severe case of bumming out and fear (not really sure why). This time, there is the benefit of unlimited runs of the online videos and besides, Dave has dumbed it down sufficiently for beginners, so looks like a lot of fun. So far, the lessons have been quite exciting really. Need to buy a good electric guitar.

It was also evaluation week at work. Usual reviews - nothing unexpected except that what was in my head so far is now apparent to the world. Motivation or rather lack of it.....apparently, they have not seen anyone ranked as high on technicals and productivity to be ranked as low on motivation.... so now its an open secret!

More travel lined up for next week. Can’t wait to meet S and A at Philly next weekend. Until then – Adios!