I spent at least a decade in academia. So I’m well aware that a tech “sabbatical” is a pretty pathetic thing. Three weeks, every five years.
I start mine on my birthday a little over a week from now. I’m attaching my extra three weeks to a “shutdown” (Adobe has 4 weeks of enforced vacation this year, one for each quarter, taking vacation as it turns out helps Adobe’s bottom line).
What to do with this precious gift of time? Something as far away from work (and it’s inflection on my life) as possible. What is my life at work? I admit up front I have an amazing job. If I must have a job, this job is an intellectual and monetary blessing. Here’s what I do. Figuring out what is next. Lots of strategy and imagination. Never a world of daily, repetitious grind exactly. But. It’s stressful. Action items. Next steps. Plans. Milestones. Proposals. Processes. Workflows. Guidelines. Accountability. Business goals. Lots of meetings. Lots of talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. You get the idea. . . . .
So here’s my plan. I get in my car and head East. I’m hoping to land in Williamsburg, where my son and family live, about half way into the two weeks--more or less. Really the plan is no plan. I have GPS. I have a computer. I have an iPOD. I have cell phones (which thankfully may be “out of service” a significant part of the time). Take it a day at a time. Smell the roses. I keep inviting folks to come with me. The requirements: No planning to speak of. And I get to decide what comes from the speakers. Mostly books. So far no one seems up for the trip. Which is fine. Another part of the plan: not much talk, no action items, mushy milestones, quiet, peace. I think this means avoiding cities. Which is fine. Also probably not that many museums, tourist musts.
On the way out, I’m going to complete the tour of the history that organized my childhood, my young adulthood, that presses on my imaginative life still. Mormonism. My son has called me an gentle apostate, as I recall (Nathan you can correct the phrasing). But here are the only cities on my plan beyond Williamsburg/ Jamestown. Nauvoo, Illinois (I’ve been there). I have a colleague at work from Illinois who needed a basic lesson in how to find these places on my list. Kirtland, Ohio (haven’t been there). Palmyra and Manchester, New York.
That’s pretty much the plan. Though my colleague at work recommends Highway 12 in Idaho. Highway 6 in the midwest. I have a few more notes I’m not remembering now. I’m also thinking I want to go through a few states I haven’t visited yet. Put a few more push pins on my map.
But that’s the plan. And that is all the plan I’ll have. The anti-work sabbatical. With no deliverables at the end. But a bit more peace and quiet and serenity in my head.
Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Friday, August 07, 2009
My adventure
Here are some pictures that Sarah took the day of my excellent adventure with TGA. I really am pretty vague in remembering anything until the very end--vaguely remember the picture with nurse and doctor. I do remember the lake. We were waiting for Don’s plane.
Update. I’ve had a further test (EEG). And the results were good. Doctor agrees I had an episode of Transient Global Amnesia. How weird this all was. Still can’t remember that day until the afternoon.
Update. I’ve had a further test (EEG). And the results were good. Doctor agrees I had an episode of Transient Global Amnesia. How weird this all was. Still can’t remember that day until the afternoon.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
A weird trip
Last week I took a very weird trip. The first thing I remember is sitting in a hospital room, my daughter Sarah telling me to read the papers in my hand and at the same time plying me with food--a burrito, chips, a soda. I kept reading and rereading the story my daughter handed me, trying to make sense of the words on the page:
“Mom you woke up this morning feeling disoriented (about 6:30 am). You called Don. He called me. I called the paramedics. I met you at your house and the paramedics decided to bring you to Northwest Hospital by ambulance. This morning you dressed yourself and have great physical response. Not a big stroke or something. Maybe something small & localized.
At 10:00 a.m. this morning you will have an MRI that will last about 45 minutes. They will check for a small stroke. (You have no bleeds.) Dr. Hooker has glasses and a moustache. He thinks you have global localized amnesia (?) which he sees about once a year. It is rare but people recover and have normal function after the event (just can’t remember week or so around the event). Don called your work & they know you aren’t coming in. Don will probably fly up soon. I will be here at the hospital with you. You are going to be fine. I love you. Your daughter, Sarah.
Don is flying up and will be here this afternoon (3 pm?). I wrote this down so you can remember what happened. The Dr. feels like this is not dementia, just an isolated memory problem from a small brain (stroke like) thing. They’ll know more after the MRI. You’ve always been calm and lucid in conversations in the moment. I will always be here nearby.
Update. (12 pm)
After the MRI the Dr. came in and told us there are no bleeds or tumors in your brain. You respond normally & remember people, surroundings etc. Good news! The neurologist will come and speak to us--likely it is transient global amnesia which means you will recover normal memory but not much about the event itself or a week or so surrounding the episode. He sees this about once a year, very rare. You’ll be ok. Your brain looks healthy and actually exceptionally ”young“
*The neurologist will come and see you later this afternoon to see how your memory is c\coming. You can remember further back--4th of July but still foggy on last week. Memory will continue to improve. Dr. will determine if you spend the night for observation. Don is on his way. You spoke on the phone here at the hospital. Relax & Know you are ok.
Discharged from hospital at 1 pm. Call for neurologist appointment after 2 pm for follow-up. Symptoms should lessen and resolve in the next day or two with no lasting problems.”
It’s now almost a week later. I have the neurologist appointment later this morning. Here’s a description of what happened to me:
Transient Global Amnesia
And here’s the story I pieced together of last Wednesday’s events. I still have no memory of that day--except for fleeting images--until I remember reading and rereading Sarah’s story of what happened. What a clever thing for Sarah to have done (apparently remembered the movie Memento).
I called Don about 6:30 am. I was confused and knew something was wrong. Don was alarmed because I had no short term memory, I kept repeating myself and asking the same question. I was particularly concerned because the back of my very green house seemed to have turned white. So it seemed that I also must be hallucinating. (Footnote: the back of the house was white. I had hired college students to fix the peeling paint, they had started the day before, and I had neglected to tell Don of the project.) When he rang off to call Sarah, I called back and started the story all over again, not remembering that I had just called. From there to the hospital Sarah tells you the story.
Don also called the office--left a voice mail on my boss’s phone and a message with one of my co-workers. Unfortunately, my boss didn’t pick up her messages. And he left the second message on the phone of the “wrong” Robin. As I began missing important meetings--my boss’s staff meeting, a follow-on meeting where I was helping with a presentation we had worked on for the previous four days--folks got worried. Freda in my office went to my house. My car was still there. But I didn’t answer the door. She went around to the back. The painters were there but had seen nothing. She looked inside the bedroom--bed made, no Susan. Finally folks talked to Margie at the reception desk, who had talked to Don. And put him through to a Robin in our group. They looked in her office and saw the phone blinking red. They called Robin at home, had her pick up her message, which was from Don. She gave Don’s number to my boss’s admin. She finally contacted Don at about noon. That’s when they learned what had become of me. They had imagined me unconscious in the house, wandering about the streets. . . . . . . .
I was discharged from the hospital in the early afternoon, still pretty vague about what had happened and what was happening. Sarah and I went to a park and waited for the time for Don’s plane. We picked him up, drove to my house. Things slowly began settling into place. Memories of the previous days mostly returning. That night I settled into read. I had been “reading” two books--reading one on my Kindle and listening to one on my ipod. I couldn’t remember the plot of the Kindle book (I was about 60% of the way through), the plot of the audiobook came back when I replayed the last five minutes. By morning I could remember the plots of both books.
And over the past week, my memory has been settling in around the remaining hole for that morning. Still weird lapses here and there. Things that just won’t stick or quite return.
Somehow this experience wasn’t frightening. Left me feeling a bit mystified and quizzical. How slight our tether to “reality” can be I guess. I knew who I was. I knew who people were. I managed to get up, shower, go through all of the details of getting ready for the day, even making my bed. I was dressed and put together when my daughter and the ambulance arrived. But my ability to maintain short-term memory was totally gone during that period. A very short loop, round and round.
Not sure the lesson. Still left wondering about that.
“Mom you woke up this morning feeling disoriented (about 6:30 am). You called Don. He called me. I called the paramedics. I met you at your house and the paramedics decided to bring you to Northwest Hospital by ambulance. This morning you dressed yourself and have great physical response. Not a big stroke or something. Maybe something small & localized.
At 10:00 a.m. this morning you will have an MRI that will last about 45 minutes. They will check for a small stroke. (You have no bleeds.) Dr. Hooker has glasses and a moustache. He thinks you have global localized amnesia (?) which he sees about once a year. It is rare but people recover and have normal function after the event (just can’t remember week or so around the event). Don called your work & they know you aren’t coming in. Don will probably fly up soon. I will be here at the hospital with you. You are going to be fine. I love you. Your daughter, Sarah.
Don is flying up and will be here this afternoon (3 pm?). I wrote this down so you can remember what happened. The Dr. feels like this is not dementia, just an isolated memory problem from a small brain (stroke like) thing. They’ll know more after the MRI. You’ve always been calm and lucid in conversations in the moment. I will always be here nearby.
Update. (12 pm)
After the MRI the Dr. came in and told us there are no bleeds or tumors in your brain. You respond normally & remember people, surroundings etc. Good news! The neurologist will come and speak to us--likely it is transient global amnesia which means you will recover normal memory but not much about the event itself or a week or so surrounding the episode. He sees this about once a year, very rare. You’ll be ok. Your brain looks healthy and actually exceptionally ”young“
*The neurologist will come and see you later this afternoon to see how your memory is c\coming. You can remember further back--4th of July but still foggy on last week. Memory will continue to improve. Dr. will determine if you spend the night for observation. Don is on his way. You spoke on the phone here at the hospital. Relax & Know you are ok.
Discharged from hospital at 1 pm. Call for neurologist appointment after 2 pm for follow-up. Symptoms should lessen and resolve in the next day or two with no lasting problems.”
It’s now almost a week later. I have the neurologist appointment later this morning. Here’s a description of what happened to me:
Transient Global Amnesia
And here’s the story I pieced together of last Wednesday’s events. I still have no memory of that day--except for fleeting images--until I remember reading and rereading Sarah’s story of what happened. What a clever thing for Sarah to have done (apparently remembered the movie Memento).
I called Don about 6:30 am. I was confused and knew something was wrong. Don was alarmed because I had no short term memory, I kept repeating myself and asking the same question. I was particularly concerned because the back of my very green house seemed to have turned white. So it seemed that I also must be hallucinating. (Footnote: the back of the house was white. I had hired college students to fix the peeling paint, they had started the day before, and I had neglected to tell Don of the project.) When he rang off to call Sarah, I called back and started the story all over again, not remembering that I had just called. From there to the hospital Sarah tells you the story.
Don also called the office--left a voice mail on my boss’s phone and a message with one of my co-workers. Unfortunately, my boss didn’t pick up her messages. And he left the second message on the phone of the “wrong” Robin. As I began missing important meetings--my boss’s staff meeting, a follow-on meeting where I was helping with a presentation we had worked on for the previous four days--folks got worried. Freda in my office went to my house. My car was still there. But I didn’t answer the door. She went around to the back. The painters were there but had seen nothing. She looked inside the bedroom--bed made, no Susan. Finally folks talked to Margie at the reception desk, who had talked to Don. And put him through to a Robin in our group. They looked in her office and saw the phone blinking red. They called Robin at home, had her pick up her message, which was from Don. She gave Don’s number to my boss’s admin. She finally contacted Don at about noon. That’s when they learned what had become of me. They had imagined me unconscious in the house, wandering about the streets. . . . . . . .
I was discharged from the hospital in the early afternoon, still pretty vague about what had happened and what was happening. Sarah and I went to a park and waited for the time for Don’s plane. We picked him up, drove to my house. Things slowly began settling into place. Memories of the previous days mostly returning. That night I settled into read. I had been “reading” two books--reading one on my Kindle and listening to one on my ipod. I couldn’t remember the plot of the Kindle book (I was about 60% of the way through), the plot of the audiobook came back when I replayed the last five minutes. By morning I could remember the plots of both books.
And over the past week, my memory has been settling in around the remaining hole for that morning. Still weird lapses here and there. Things that just won’t stick or quite return.
Somehow this experience wasn’t frightening. Left me feeling a bit mystified and quizzical. How slight our tether to “reality” can be I guess. I knew who I was. I knew who people were. I managed to get up, shower, go through all of the details of getting ready for the day, even making my bed. I was dressed and put together when my daughter and the ambulance arrived. But my ability to maintain short-term memory was totally gone during that period. A very short loop, round and round.
Not sure the lesson. Still left wondering about that.
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
What I did on my summer vacation
Here are photo’s of last week. Spent on the Olympic Peninsula. Rialto Beach, the river, Hoh Rain Forest, La Push. Washington is a wonderful place. Played backwards I believe. A little narrative chaos for good measure.
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Daddy's Toupe(e)
These are pictures of my dad.
Notice the hair. By the time all of these pictures were taken, my dad was completely bald (a little fringe around the nether edges). He lost his hair on his mission. This means that by his early twenties he had no hair to speak of. Legend has it that as a young man he had an amazing head of hair--auburn hair. This was important to me because I was known as a young person as the “red head.”
But by the time he returned from his mission, courted my mother (another wonderful story), he had no hair. In the late twenties, early thirties of the last century, that was definitely not cool. So until well into my childhood, my dad wore a toupe(e)--sort of.
My dad was a farmer, a laborer. He worked in the fields, worked with his hands. He completed high school, but then went to work. So during the work week my dad was a bald man. On Sunday and for special occasions (like pictures), my dad had a head of hair.
I well remember Sunday mornings growing up. My family getting ready to go to church. For Daddy that meant taking the toupe(e) out of the box. I remember that he would cut tiny pieces of white adhesive tape, loop them, set them on the oil stove we had (no furnace at that point) to warm. And the toupe(e) would sit there as well--to warm. He’d pluck the loops from the stove, arrange them on the inside of the hairpiece, and plunk it on his head. On for morning services. Off for lunch and the afternoon. On again for evening services.
Or for funerals, special occasions. On. A fashion accouterment as I think of it now. Like a hat. And for years, lots of real actual hats during the week (I should post another slideshow of my daddy with hats in his early years).
By the time I was in late childhood, my teens, the Sunday ritual was gone. My daddy was a very bald man. Grey hair with blackish highlights (I never saw the red). A tie and a suit on Sunday--that was the end of the dress up.
Those images of the loops of white adhesive tape on the stove in the living room on a Sunday morning. And the toupe by the side of those loops. An image in a child’s memory.
Notice the hair. By the time all of these pictures were taken, my dad was completely bald (a little fringe around the nether edges). He lost his hair on his mission. This means that by his early twenties he had no hair to speak of. Legend has it that as a young man he had an amazing head of hair--auburn hair. This was important to me because I was known as a young person as the “red head.”
But by the time he returned from his mission, courted my mother (another wonderful story), he had no hair. In the late twenties, early thirties of the last century, that was definitely not cool. So until well into my childhood, my dad wore a toupe(e)--sort of.
My dad was a farmer, a laborer. He worked in the fields, worked with his hands. He completed high school, but then went to work. So during the work week my dad was a bald man. On Sunday and for special occasions (like pictures), my dad had a head of hair.
I well remember Sunday mornings growing up. My family getting ready to go to church. For Daddy that meant taking the toupe(e) out of the box. I remember that he would cut tiny pieces of white adhesive tape, loop them, set them on the oil stove we had (no furnace at that point) to warm. And the toupe(e) would sit there as well--to warm. He’d pluck the loops from the stove, arrange them on the inside of the hairpiece, and plunk it on his head. On for morning services. Off for lunch and the afternoon. On again for evening services.
Or for funerals, special occasions. On. A fashion accouterment as I think of it now. Like a hat. And for years, lots of real actual hats during the week (I should post another slideshow of my daddy with hats in his early years).
By the time I was in late childhood, my teens, the Sunday ritual was gone. My daddy was a very bald man. Grey hair with blackish highlights (I never saw the red). A tie and a suit on Sunday--that was the end of the dress up.
Those images of the loops of white adhesive tape on the stove in the living room on a Sunday morning. And the toupe by the side of those loops. An image in a child’s memory.
Monday, May 18, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Books galore
I do have a problem. A garage in California full of books. A house in California full of books. All the brand new shelves I had in the house in Seattle--filling up with books.
How to manage what I know defines me in very real ways. But can get out of hand. Options I’ve discovered:
A pathetic story??
How to manage what I know defines me in very real ways. But can get out of hand. Options I’ve discovered:
- Libraries. Take too much planning. Never did these that successfully. At one point in time returned a car full of books to the library. And later found them all on the shelves. Do you know how hard it is to get books “deaccessioned” (is that how you spell it) from the University of Utah library.
- Books. I’ve talked to you about that. Filling up my house(s). And I had a basement full of shelves built to help manage the problem.
- Audiobooks. AAAAAAAAH. What a wonderful discovery (Audiobooks. . . . ) I love being read to. I can read while I drive, while I work, while I’m supposed to be reading, while I walk or run, while I hang out with Bev, while I go out to eat with Bev--you get the idea. No media. But not all books are available. And I still like to read (eyes on words).
- And now my latest vice. I bought a Kindle. Here’s the sad story. I’m listening to Little Dorrit (a fine Dickens novel brought to my mind again by a very good Masterpiece Classics adaptation). I always have trouble with that first chapter. What is going on? What in the world does this chapter have to do with the book? So I went to the walls of books on my shelves. And who knew. I had no copy of Little Dorrit. Wanting to solve the problem that minute I went to Amazon and bought a copy of the book. And then I saw the Kindle version--I could have gotten Little Dorrit for free or near it. What a world. I remembered a recent discussion with someone at work about how good the experience with Kindle is getting. The book I want to read right now--Sarah Waters’ Little Stranger is not yet available on audible.com. And it’s available--and cheaper--on Kindle’s amazon.com site. A click away.
A pathetic story??
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