My Cross-country Skiing Adventure

The postings on this site are my own and don't necessarily represent IBM's positions, strategies.

Brief, but Sweet

What an excellent afternoon I've had, thanks to a satisfyingly arm-wrenching amount of exercise on my cross-country skis. I wore my iPod and ski-goggles and still felt the wind, burning the exposed part of my cheeks, just like when I played in the snow as a kid or went down-hill skiing throughout my adolescence. And it's the most powerful feeling I know to walk with my left arm slung over the front half of my skis as I walk to and from my destination with them perched on my left shoulder. Just like with rollerblading, probably, I think I look so much cooler than I do when I'm carrying the skis so cavalierly....

The sun was bright and the air was colder than I expected. Cars passed and I wanted to be seen, but didn't look at the people in them, as I didn't want to seem less cool by doing so.

If I could play in nature daily, I'm sure I'd be calmer and more satisfied with my life.

Here was the musical score for my adventure:

1. Your Woman - White Town
   
2. Everything You Want - Vertical Horizon
   
3. Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice
   
4. My Boo - Usher & Alicia Keys
   
5. Automatic - Ultra Nate
   
6. New Year's Day - U2
   
7. Pride (In the Name of Love) - U2
   
8. I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking for - U2
   
9. Spread My Wings - Troop
   
10. All I Do is Think of You - Troop
    
11. Bonita Applebum - A Tribe Called Quest
    
12. Fast Car - Tracy Chapman
    
13. Talkin' Bout a Revolution - Tracy Chapman
    
14. The Piano Has Been Drinking (Not Me) - Tom Waits
    
15. Life Is a Highway - Tom Cochrane
    
16. Hello It's Me - Todd Rundgren
    
17. No Scrubs - TLC
    
18. Voices Carry - 'Til Tuesday
    

Thomas Dolby's "She Blinded Me with Science" is continuing on my laptop where my iPod left off. It reminds me of dances during my senior year of high school, after my dad of blessed memory died. Music is so hope-delivering. Teena Marie's on now: "I Need Your Lovin'" -- bought it twice by mistake, but it's so good, maybe I'll listen to it twice. Reminds me of rollerskating at 15.

"Square Biz" by Teena Marie came next, in '81 and was an even better roller-skating song. Lady T's "Lovergirl" came out my sophomore year at Michigan and it reminds me of going to the town's lesbian bar at the time, the Rubiyat, as clandestinely as possible. Watched, mesmerized, as a smooth-dancing brunette led another woman around the dance-floor to it.

Tears for Fears' "Shout" came out the same year and it told me persistently to "Shout, shout, let it all out...." I didn't listen for another three years, when I finally came out as lesbian to my family. Fortunately, no shouting was involved.

T.V. Carpio was introduced to me just a couple of years ago by a colleague at work. He told me she sang the Beatles' "I Want to Hold Your Hand" to another woman heartbreakingly, from the movie, "Across the Universe;" I still need to see the film.

I'd like to say I recall hearing Sylvester's "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)" in 1978 when I was 13, but I'm not sure that's true. Still, as soon as I did, it became a favorite and is playing on my iPod now. "Tom's Diner" by Suzanne Vega reminds me of living with my first girlfriend on Roscoe and Broadway in Chicago, even though "Luka" was the song that came out in 1987, when we lived together. "Tom's Diner" came out in '84 apparently. Till reading about it on Wikipedia just now, I never realized that it was referring to the restaurant near my partner's aunt's home. Pat's aunt died in 2006, but I still pass the restaurant all the time on my way to class at Teacher's College.

What memories will I recall in 2029 (God willing) about the music I'm listening to in 2009?

Nature Loving or...

The postings on this site are my own and don’t necessarily represent IBM’s positions, strategies or opinions.

How I Got Over Self-absorption...for Now

On the Green Heritage Walk, which began in Lal Bagh this morning at 7 am, Pat and I, plus Michele, who we met through a colleague, since she's also on a training assignment from the United States for her company, were the only non-Indians.

"The tiny berries on that branch were like little children, playing on a tree; that's how it was in my imagination, so no, it wasn't random," said one of the women I asked:

"Did you come today because you love nature, or was it random?"

What a charming imagination she had. Yesterday, Pat and I were morose from having had our first experience at a beauty salon in India. "Beauty salon" was a misnomer, and I can leave it almost at that, except to confirm that my worst fears became a self-fulfilling prophecy, and just as I had blogged about a few days ago, I've got "v"s now in front of my ears.

But I don't want to get in a bad mood again; I mentioned yesterday especially to contrast it with the fun of today.

Some Notes I Scribbled While Listening to Vijay, Our Guide

"The rock at Lal Bagh is more than half as old as the world itself...three billion years old." It is made of the gneiss -- a combo of granite, mica and quartz -- which is also common, I've noticed while commuting, on the Saw Mill River Parkway and 684N; it's just much younger, apparently.

Later, when we saw Dahlias and Gladioli in the glass house as award winners among the flower show, I was reminded of those species in our own garden in New Jersey. And we also saw the fruit of the Silk Cotton tree whose inside reminded me of Milkweed pods' insides.

Michele and Pat remembered Milkweed, too, though we grew up in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Connecticut respectively.

"Hyder Ali created the garden as an act of piety. Muslims think of garden creation as pious, since they're reflections of paradise on earth; Mohammed grew up in the desert."

A Danish, presumably Christian, missionary and doctor became a steward of the garden after Tipu Sultan and what began as a tribute to Islam was ushered along by people of different faiths and native lands.

If only flowers and plants and trees could distract everyone from what become the divisive parts of our religious differences.

"Looking for a new homeland, the Aryans finally hit the fertile Indus Valley, asking, 'Which were the trees and woods from which God created the heavens and earth?'"

Frames of Reference Frame Our Thinking

When Vijay spoke of Aryans, why did I have to free-associate silently/at all, thinking of the many swastikas I've seen in Bangalore since my arrival? Both terms were appropriated by the Nazis, but had no connection to them in fact.

I would do well to open my mind beyond the two religions I've grown up around, Judaism and Christianity, and learn more about Hinduism's history.

On Friday, two Hindu colleagues were telling me how Krishna's insistence that Arjuna finish the job he set out to do, of killing the non-righteous half of the land-seekers, was all about leadership and fulfilling one's duty.

This was in response to my saying that last time I was here, in 2005, a number of the participants in the leadership development training program I led told me that everything anyone needed to know about management and leadership was in the Mahābhārata.

"They were right," my Brahmin colleague said, and then provided the example of this story. She also said that she was well-versed in the Scriptures because her grandmother used to read her siblings and her a story from them nightly. And when her cousins and siblings and she all got together, her grandmother would read to everyone pre-sleep, and the story would go on sometimes for 30 minutes, which delayed bed-time, which all of them relished.

Divine Trees

Krishna told Arjuna that among tree manifestations, "I'm the Ficus Religiosa, the 'People Tree,'" as it's called in India. It had heart-shaped leaves and grew to majestic heights, like the one we saw in the garden.

We also saw the Ficus Krishna, the leaves of which invert themselves to become spoon-like and it was said that Krishna used the leaves to collect butter.

The rest of this entry features a prose poem made up purely of the trees we saw after the Ficus Krishna, including links to Vijay's musings on particular ones among them:

Banyan...Colville's Glory...Jackfruit...
Indian Satinwood...Australian Chestnut...broad-leafed pine...
Amherst Nobilis...Pride of India...Mango...
Elephant Apple...Silk Cotton...Australian Bottle....