Days, Weeks, Months...

Today is the 22nd consecutive day that I've woken up early and started my day with a workout.  I'm past my physical prime, but I still have it in me to be in great shape.  I feel great.

I made a goal 3 weeks ago to exercise every day after seeing someone else talk about the same goal they had that turned into years.  I've passed the 3 week mark and it's routine now.

Exercise isn't the only thing that's changed.  My brain and stomach have come together and I've chosen better food to eat.  It wasn't really intentional to "fix" my diet, but rather it has been a...consequence.

My point isn't really about exercise or diet or anything specific really.  This exercise thing is reminding me that good choices start one day at a time.  Good habits and routines start from a beginning.  So do bad ones.  Often, too, for me good choices lead to other good choices.  And probably the same for bad ones.

I'm looking around me at my wall of pictures seeing how the important people in my life have changed so much over the days, weeks, months, and years.  My walls of pictures serve many purposes.  One of them is to remind me that things change faster than I realize.  Do good now.  Be good now.  Think about what you have right now.  It will be easier to do/be/think tomorrow.

It's never too late to be great!  (I'm a poet in my spare time:P)

A small step...

NASA made it official, the Voyager crossed into interstellar space.

I wrote about being fascinated by the things the golden record contained in the Voyager.  I am so inspired by its grandness.  It opens my mind further to the giant universe we live in.  At the same time and probably more importantly, it reminds me of my smallness.

I'm also reminded to reach for the stars...literally.

Future

"I have seen the future and it's still in the future"...the future of George Jetson at least.  I'm not quite sure when that quote was written originally, but it us just as relevant now.

I'm rereading a book originally written over 10 years ago that is a compilation of the previous 10 years marvelling at the technology advances in the 90's and also making light of some of our collective notions of the future back then.

As my thoughts often do, they turned toward the family. In a week Yusuf will start kindergarten which just blows my mind and Nooriya is on the verge of reading and doing so many new things.

Yusuf is asking me so many intelligent questions and Nooriya is following his lead. The questions are getting to be too hard for me and we are frequently looking things up in books and Googling. The last few months have been very transformative for me as a parent. Much of my caregiving is becoming teaching and explaining. Less is meeting their basic needs. It's awesome. I am in the best place I've ever been with Zahra too.

I feel much the same as I have for the last twenty years or so. Feeling as if I'm in and just entering the best stage of my life.

Zahra and I think about the future as in the next six months or year, but I don't really think seriously past that.

This book makes so obvious to me how fast things change. I don't know if the author's intent is to push me to dream about the future that might be. If that's the case the author has failed because it is making me focus on right now. Right now is a 'simpler time' just as two years ago was 'simpler' and six year's ago was even 'simpler' and a hundred years.... Inshallah ten years will pass and instead of longing for a 'simpler' time then I will look around and appreciate the simpleness then. And Inshallah ten years after that and ten years after that and ten years....

Life as a zoo

I'm rereading a book I first read almost ten years ago. A small chapter I read fast the first time caught my attention and is packed with lines to remember.

The short passage is about taking care of animals in a zoo. The thinking about animals resonates so much with me about people and ourplace. In essence, the chapter is about escape. This quote sums up the chapter very well.

"Everything in an enclosure must be just right-in other words, within the limits of an animal's ability to adapt"

We parallel animals in a zoo in so many ways. There is one major difference I see. Unlike animals that may try to escape the zoo from something, we are escaping to something.

Attitude and Intention

It's Ramadan and every year I turn inward and think about all that's been given to me and do my best to appreciate it. I think a lot about the illusion of control and everything that really isn't in my control at all. All with the goal of trying hard to be aware of all the things in my life.

The last few weeks and this Ramadan I'm taking the opposite approach. I think so much about what isn't in my control that I forget about what is. My attitude and my intention are the two things I can think of that are truly in my control. Also gifts to be sure, but up to me how to make use of these tools.

This year, alongside remembering all the things that are in my life because of no effort of my own or at most the illusion of my effort, I will remember constantly what is in my control. 

Infinity

I love math because it is full of very abstract concepts with implications about our world once you get passed the foundation stuff.  I'm guessing this is just as true for any of the other sciences that attempts to describe our world.

I'm rereading a book from the bookshelf, "Chaos".  It's probably very boring to most, but I find it fascinating.  The book talks about how the study of chaos began.  If nothing else, I want to remember it is a study fundamentally about perspective.

Nature has this property where no matter how much you zoom in or out things look irregular. A snapshot of a coastline at 1000 feet altitude or 1 millimeter altitude will look pretty much the same. The study of chaos has the central theme that there is a "regular irregularity" to the world.  Mind blown!

Reading this book has also got me remembering the painter's paradox or Gabriel's horn.  Basically, it's a shape that has the property that you could fill it with paint, but never have enough paint to paint the outside.  I learned about this in high school basic calculus and my reaction was probably not much deeper than "this is cool".

The point I want to takeaway from this is to remember in math and in life there are things I can and can't understand AND I need to be aware of that.

Record

I'm taking an interest in digital privacy or lack of.  I'm learning that nothing I write in an email (whether sent or not) or blog or anything digital and connected to the internet isn't mine anymore.  All that (and this) is relinquished by me and recorded.  I have some strong opinions about privacy, but that's not what's on my mind today.

Today, I'm thinking about what kind of trail I'm leaving and what I will continue to leave. I think it's really great that we now have a record to pass down to Yusuf, Nooriya, and next generations.  I also think it's really not great that it's so easy to mold someone's digital historical record this way or that. Just the same way numbers and statistics get skewed and misinterpreted all the time, so too will our records.

A couple of stories in the news right now are taking a people's digital history and compiling them to portray them as this or that.  Technically, I guess they're speaking for themselves which is great, but probably a lot out of context and over many years.  A "regular" guy is a hero or a villain or a genius or a moron depending.

I think back at the last 15 years and all the things I did as a dumb kid without foresight and I'm thankful that not much of that is recorded, at least not that I know of.  I have, though, recorded a bunch of stuff and am concerned that taken the wrong way and out of context.  I know how I would like to be remembered and I hope whatever I leave behind doesn't get twisted into something else.

Prediction

"A prediction that the sun will rise is no more rational than a prediction the sun won't rise...don't blame nature because you are too daft to understand it"

Baye's simple description of the world is rich with philosophical implications. If you believe something 100%, no amount of evidence can convince you otherwise.

Awesomeness

Yesterday Yusuf told me that we "should get a pool in the backyard because it is awesome".

It is awesome.  The more I thought about it his logic is flawless.

I'm going to do more stuff because it's awesome...maybe not a pool though:P

Forward

I read about a solar powered plane that could fly through the night.  The plane is not practical.  It's slow, difficult to maneuver, and has other limitations.  The scientist summed up why all the effort was being put into this project as "breaking the assumptions of what's possible".

It is amazing to think about where we are compared to were not too long ago.  I am amazed by the things I now think possible that I couldn't really imagine just a little while ago.  I write this as both a warning not to fall complacent and a reminder to myself to keep moving towards something.  Anything is possible.

Order out of disorder

I saw this and first thought that it was just cool.



I think back to every summer and seeing fireflies and watching them randomly flicker and remember thinking nothing of it.  I then saw this video of thousands of fireflies flashing in unison.  Amazing.

 Among other places where fireflies live, they flashed in unison on this river in Thailand.  Just discovered, maybe 50 years ago.  In the dark, silent night.  Amazing! and for no one to see.  And they've probably been doing it for thousands of years.

And my immediate assumption is that there is "no one to see".  Subtle, but I realize that my assumption that there should be someone to see, someone to understand is very presumptuous.  My reaction of isn't only wonder and appreciation, it's something more and marked with hubris.  I also think of my definition of the word random.

Random is a human construct, a human definition.  It's an explanation for something that can't be explained.  Just like fireflies who appear to flash randomly one at a time, but thousands together have a pattern.  Random is just a matter of perspective.  Things may appear random to me, but I shouldn't think they aren't without a purpose.

"Cookie time!"

I love having cookies and milk with the kids. Nooriya is learning how to dip cookies in milk, it's a little messy:-)

Saturday mornings

I love my Saturday mornings, most Saturdays in the morning it its just me and Nooriya. Too soon she will go to madrasa too:'(

Who's who

I'm pretty sure I didn't encourage either one of them to say this:-)

"I want to be a builder when I grow up"

"I want to be a princess when I grow up!"

Storytime

After many many times gong to Storytime at the library she finally sat by herself. I'm proud of her, but mostly sad she's not cuddling with me in my lap:'(

Best Birthday Ever!

For some reason Yusuf wanted to throw me a surprise birthday party the other night.  My birthday isn't for months, but this was awesome still.

The party was complete with decorations Yusuf had cut out and taped to the wall, invitations, party hats, a construction paper cake with candles, and a happy birthday song that Yusuf wrote the lyrics out for.

It was so amazing to be the center of his attention and I have some precious souvenirs from the party I plan to keep for a long time.  Hopefully they're a small part of what I'll continue to collect from Yusuf and Nooriya.

Thanks Yusuf! (and Zahra)

"I Love You You are the best and the great"

Party Balloon and Cake

"I Love you and you are the best and supur! good! and nice!"

This is the invitation outside

 This is the invitation inside, "Dear Abba, Yusuf and Nooriya and Mumy have a extra special surprise at home and it is a secret."

Yusuf wrapped some presents and made some party hats!

Peacock

Dad told me something really nice tonight.

In English, "a peacock doesn't need to be painted".  He said it much more eloquently in Gujarati.  He said it about mostly about Yusuf, but about me too.  I don't want to write down what I think it means now.  I want to read this a long time from now and re-interpret it.

SLOW DOWN!

Today Yusuf is going on his first sleepover.  I wasn't ready for him to be going out on his own and spending the night away when my mom called and said to send him over.  He's super excited even though I'm kind of scared.

Also, in the car he was telling me about how in five years he'd be ten.  Ten!

Yusuf is blowing my mind a little today:)

Quotes

I'm reading a history of risk and these are a couple quotes I know I will want to come back to read.

"The actions we dare to take, which depend on how free we are to make choices, are what the story of risk is all about.  And that story helps define what it means to be a human being."

"If everything is a matter of luck, risk management is a meaningless exercise.  Invoking luck obscures truth, because it separates an event from its cause."

"Once we understand that we are not obliged to accept the spin of the roulette wheel or the cards we are dealt, we are free souls.  Our decisions matter.  We can change the world."

Ice Cream

The other night I watched Nooriya eat a cup of ice cream.  I watch her intently and two thoughts struck me as she worked to get as much ice cream as possible successfully into her mouth.

One...She was so singularly focused on her task.  She sat there using an adult size spoon that was too big for her trying to get as much ice cream out of the bowl and to her mouth.  She patiently and carefully took each bite of ice cream out of the bowl with complete concentration.  She dropped a little bit on the table, a lot on her face and some in her mouth.  I was a bit jealous of her ability to be so focused and her ability to block out pretty much everything else.

Two...I was reminded of the enormity of my responsibility.  She was able to be so unaware of everything that wasn't ice cream in that moment.  That's my job to be aware for her.  It was a great moment for me to remember I just have a very few number of tasks in my life that I need to focus on.  I enjoyed my ice cream as much as Nooriya did because she so clearly reminded me that my most important things to focus on were sitting at the table eating ice cream with me.