A glance at the clock. It’s 11pm. I usually try call it a night by 11pm. The last couple nights I’ve seen 12:30pm before I made myself stop looking at the clock. Just had to get some stuff done.

Sometimes I think it’s because I have to serialize myself through this keyboard. Kickin’ it QWERTY style. If only I could find that gadget to keep me connected. Maybe it’s time for the iPhone. I want to be able to talk to something and have it sent me an email of what I said. I want my house to listen and respond to information requests. That’s probably a way off though.

Sought some decompression today through golf. It was sunny and warm. First round of the year. The next won’t be for another month. I golfed with a retired aero-space engineer and an incredibly fit asian neuro-surgeon medical student who will learn tomorrow where his 7 year neuro-surgery residency will be. His first choice? John Hopkins in Baltimore. He golfed par. I don’t know what I golfed. I didn’t keep score.

It’s been a long hard road the last few years. Taking classes to fulfill this degree has been arduous. I’m a better person for it. I’ve learned a lot and have been applying what I learn as I’ve been learning it. But still, something is missing. I think it’s interaction, engagement, co-creation. I’m not sure. I’m getting closer though. I love creating things that are useful and get people to interact.

Apparently my personality is one that thrives on feedback and interaction. I need feedback to make good decisions. Otherwise I feel like I’m wandering aimlessly, lost. I find it hard to get people to give you their feedback straight up. Not everybody is a waltzing bear.

W. was asleep when I got home tonight. She mumbled acknowledgement when I rubbed her leg so hopefully she doesn’t wake up later and wonder where I am. My mother used to have us wake her up when we got home late from babysitting. She didn’t want to wake up later and wonder if we’d made it home. She’d say weird things though, dredged from whatever dream she was having.

I didn’t leave the B school until about 10:00pm. After chatting with classmates and walking across campus through throngs of drunken beaded students wearing alls kinds of green I didn’t get home and connected until about 10:40pm. Surf the nets, look for feedback, then give some. Capture the moment.

I’m listening to Sade. I’m tired. I have class tomorrow morning. I have lots to do at work. Spring is parked out front. The living rushing by. Missing my cat every day.

Image: I just like this tree and building. Took this picture last week walking to West Hall.

1. Sade, Soldier of Love, “Long Hard Road”

But right now, even though I could be working on a white paper draft due in less than two weeks, I’m watching cartoons. It’s not like the paper doesn’t have a good start, we’ve already drafted a good part of it. So I watch episodes of Cowboy Bebop that I’ve seen at least twice already. While scheduling group meetings for the weekend.

Judging by how few of my classmates I see online, I suspect they are occupying themselves elsewhere. Hopefully they’re watching alligators or enjoying live music or exploring another country. Seems like a classmate is in Ireland at the moment.

I’m in my basement office, thinking about how value is created. Thinking about how value is created through the tools and resources we use and wondering how to find where things can be improved. Kind of abstract, but I’m working at it. Project’s need direction, attention needs focus. Evolution is driven by competing forces.

So easy to get caught in the raging flow. Swept along. Forced by the current, the circumstance.

The marketing strategy class I’m taking has me working on a white paper whose purpose is to identify areas of engagement in a certain business or industry, the value gained from those engagements, and how to increase the value to those involved. These areas of interaction can be with customers, other businesses, other business units, departments, teams, and coworkers. You get the picture, the blank canvas.

This blog is an engagement platform. It is an unfolding story where we can co-create value. Granted, it’s in the form of page reads and the coveted comment, but there can be value in both writing and reading a blog…and not always at the same time. These types of ramblings aren’t entertaining to everyone. Writing has a certain voice…and some voices are just annoying.

Getting back to creating valuable experiences through things that allow people to connect…

The experience of interaction, the accessibility of information, the structure of an interface, these things  play a critical role in creating valuable experiences. An equally critical role, and dependent upon the aforementioned, is the coming together of interface with interested party.

That’s when cool things happen. That’s when an engagement platform becomes the structure to a more meaningful experience, be it a blog, a web site, a portal, a program, computer, a mobile device. At that point they are vehicles connecting people, allowing experience to unfold, allow value to be created collaboratively.

Or it might be a white canvas of potential, waiting patiently for time and attention to come together in a way that engages the soul. It’s a tall order. But being the viewer, and being engaged, should be enough to start with.

In between school and the whirling dance of complex interactions that is software development, I find myself making connections to things I’ve studied during the the last 7 semesters¹.

Whether I’m talking to a classmate, sharing insights on group dynamics, or discussing how to implement new features in an existing product interface, the principles, questions, concepts, and lessons learned on perception, cognition, architecture, collaboration, design, and innovation all come to mind providing me with words to better articulate or question.

So that’s a long winded way of saying that this school stuff might really work. Education isn’t a tangible thing. Sure, there’s a piece of paper that can be framed and hung on a wall somewhere, but that piece of paper doesn’t solve problems. Education, besides expanding the mind by exploring the depths of the world, builds in our minds a lens that can be used to find new ideas.

The lens in my mind has been focused on how people use technology to get things done. Fundamental to using technology is the interaction, the engagement, the experience of it.

To understand experience is to understand multiple perspectives and circumstances. Insights can come from watching the experiences of others. It can also come from experiencing something oneself. Experience resulting from interactions with products and services all happen within certain constraints. The establishment and modification of these constraints is one side of the innovation coin. The other is finding those ideas nobody else can see.

And that’s where the lens I mentioned comes into play.

Time for me to go to work. I feel a little like I have a cold starting to form in my sinuses and throat. That’s not cool.

Image: Took this in the lowest level of the U of M Law Library while searching for a bathroom. The place is freaky huge. And lots of green carpet.

1. 7 semesters = Fall 2006 – Spring 2010

The two classes promise to educate and awaken my brain. In one class I’m learning to summarize and describe comparative relationships among relative events and in the other I’m learning that relating people to events involves interaction and value. Create an experience. Recognize and cultivate the relationship.

What is the probability that a person will develop loyalty and become a proponent and user of a particular product or service if those creating the product or service involve them in its creation and use?

It seems intuitive. It could be compared to tending a garden. Learn to recognize a thirsty plant and you’ll know when to water it. Watch the conditions in which your plants grow and watch the plants themselves. They communicate their needs in ways that require study to understand. They can’t text our phone to tell us they’re thirsty or that beetles are eating all their leaves and they need help. Those are just technical problems that can be solved by creative computer engineers.

Which brings me to the title of this post. It occurs to me that the notion of co-creation¹ bears resemblance to the idea of dependent arising in Buddhism and its perspectives on cause and effect.

Granted, one is about value and efficiency, the other about dealing with the suffering associated with being an intelligent and aware species. Then again, maybe their underlying goals aren’t so dissimilar.

Recognition of quality is critical to survival and adaptation. Quality and value are closely related. We must learn to see what matters and what needs attention.

Image: A picture of the coffee stop I stop in on my way to class in the mornings. I took pictures periodically while walking to class yesterday, a montage of sorts.

 

1. …as being taught by Dr.Ramaswamy in a similarly named course.

Today was cold and miscellaneous. Lots of things working to get traction, most things slipping and gripping for purchase.

As I wind down my studying, I can’t help but miss that cat that used to lie on my desk pushing pens and pencils around, biting at stuff. I looked through pictures of him (a mistake) and now I’m sitting here, tears pouring down my face, pissed at the futility of it. It happened so fast. And I knew I’d miss him particularly bad once school started. He was a nice study companion.

I’ve tried to avoid mentioning it. I think about him every day. So does W. We try not to talk about it. Time is helping, but the pain just doesn’t go away. It sits there, lurking, ready to surprise you when you forget about it for a second.

I can’t speak for anyone else. I can only imagine there are others feeling a pain similar to mine. The pain of losing of a loved one, a beloved pet, or something you treasured that will never happen again. We suffer because we become attached to things. It happens.

During the lonely and cold days of January winter, while I’m studying in my cold basement with a space heater barely keeping me warm, I think about things that aren’t frozen and miss things that were warm and fuzzy. I know missing and mourning is normal and will weaken eventually. It still sucks.

And I study statistics, and plotting, and R. Things like: sqrt(sum((weight – xbar)^2)/(length(weight) -1)). Soon I’ll be studying and probably writing paper for a class on marketing and the co-creation of value for businesses. Not sure what that’s going to be about, but it sounds interesting. The first class isn’t until this Wednesday evening.

Amidst the blizzard like conditions of yesterday, we searched valiantly for a vehicle that will last ten years, has enough room for my head and legs, ample cargo space, and fits in our garage. We drove two vehicles home from the dealer to find out they’re too long.

Over the last few days W and I solved a 750¹ piece puzzle. I haven’t spent time solving a picture puzzle for ages. W did most of it, sitting at the table in silence with a cup of coffee next to her. I set my camera on a tripod and took pictures at various times while it came together. I’m hoping to put them together in a time-stop animation.

The process of solving a puzzle was interesting and made me think about how the approach to puzzle solving lends itself to so many situations. It requires certain attention and focus. Demands intense study of all pieces. Breakthroughs comes by studying patterns, shapes, relationships, etc., from all the pieces. There’s a lot of cognitive processing involved.

In similar way to putting pieces of a puzzle together, W and I sat on our couch last night and worked on the new vehicle puzzle together. With an HGTV show in the background and our laptops, we worked collaboratively in a Google spreadsheet putting together a table showing comparative vehicle lengths, head room, leg room, etc. She was aghast at how nerdy it was². But convenience and ease of use is undeniable.

Winter semester starts two weeks from today with an 8:30 AM class on introductory statistics and data analysis. I’m bracing myself for what is sure to be unrelenting and intense sessions of complex puzzle solving over the next 15 weeks. My brain will be better for it, it hopes.

Image: The missing piece of the puzzle, still missing. Sometimes that happens.

1. It was actually 749…note the missing piece. And a corner of all things.
2. Though later admitted she had the same idea.

As the years pass, more faces become familiar and you can’t help but notice the maturing. The weathered eye, the momentary aching gaze, the grin, the laugh, the sigh. The innocence, the expectation, the ignorance. You feel it yourself. Experience it daily. The maturing, the learning, the realizations.

So easy to go wandering in memory, remembrance, reflection. Blog posts centered on reflection make you want to puke.

It’s not like you aren’t trying to think of new ways to approach the world, to voice things in a way that unites, encourages, stabilizes, secures. All the while knowing such a thing can’t be voiced. Realization adds a few more yards to the long stare of your weathering eye. You press on.

“The Mad Men held captive the minutes,
where elsewhere the minutes fly past.
Minutes held captive are thick and warm,
gone are the minutes of last.”
~Brown

The large black and white cat roams the dark basement, meowing loudly. He’s done this a number of times when I’ve been down here writing and W has retired for the evening. Maybe he’s calling for me. Personally I think he’s asking for something to eat, but I say this because I know him.

Holidays are both bitter and sweet. Years of learning tradition you wanted away from, only to later recognize values not seen with un-weathered eye.

I went to church today. Sat among people who have sat together for as long as I’ve been alive. The guy right next to us had been attending on and off for years. He was retired and lived in so-and-so place nearby. He smiled a lot, wore a nice suit. High above three wings of people she stood and addressed us with scripture and a twitch.

Then read of birthdays, graduations, sickness and broken hips shared earlier from those in the wings. I could have said something about Bailey, but that might have been weird. Sharing of good and bad news I imagine for encouragement and caring later. As we were leaving a young boy set up some drums, a couple guys pulled out a guitar and bass, and a women at a piano led them through the learning of some tune.

Olivia was christened I think. I’m not sure what it was called but she wore a special dress made for round cheeked 9 week old girls. People being friendly to each other because they believe it will help them reach heaven. Maybe it does.

Only a couple weeks before winter semester starts. I’m ready for the punishing it will give me. I’m cultivating the ability to endure weathering. I think it’s something we all do.

Image: Ozzie just after meowing and making noise with bells. Maybe we can get a picture of him with a jingle-jangle of toys he carries around the house, all noisy like at night.

But the last few have been fast paced and filled with familiar agony of change, effort, learning, and hard work. I’m completed a number of homework assignments, dealt (most recently) with car troubles (which continue), and brought about a design change to a product whose acceptance and successful release remain in question. Soon we’ll know, but we’re on the edge of our seats a bit.

It’s been cold. Sometimes a bitter frozen cold, sometimes a wet shivering cold. Windy too, though not so much today. The Jeep started with some zip when I picked it up from the shop today. Hadn’t realized how weak the previous battery had become. Hopefully this isn’t a metaphor.

Connected via social networking with another person of Honor and Influence from my early adult life, a person who knew a lot about attendance. Reflecting on it, lessons from other persons of Influence coalesce toward consistent themes of acceptance, awareness, and balance.

I’ll be writing a letter of support for a professor that has been nominated for something. A letter describing how this person has influenced me in positive ways and encouraged achievement. There are a few individuals that have done this and in pondering the project I’m recalling experiences.

Oh, and I’m old. I said to W recently what a treat it was to have experienced something. Who says that?!?

Anyway, had somewhat of a reason to blog, needed to find some loose articulation, and now look forward to reading some Neal Asher short stories received recently from the Book Depository.

Image: This is what I stare at waiting to cross a street on the edge of central university. The light was nice this morning so I waited through another light to get what I hoped was  decent picture.

Thinking about it now, it seems a stupid thing to say. It isn’t always true. An innocent friend pointed out; sometimes what doesn’t kill you just makes you weaker. There is truth in that. Imagine having a lung removed. It might not kill you, but you’d definitely be weaker. You wouldn’t be able to run very far or climb multiple flights of stairs. Your body would be weaker. This might be an extreme example, but it illuminates the meaninglessness of a saying.

I read a book some time ago from which the title of this post is taken. Written by a Buddhist monk, the title in full is “The Wisdom of No Escape and the Path of Loving Kindness.” In this book, Pema Chodron makes the point that working with obstacles is life’s journey. If we are to be truly awake, aware, even enlightened, one has to realize that what one has to deal with in life is normal. Surprises or not. Like a beloved pet being stricken with cancer. These events are what make up life. Obstacle or not, it is what happens. Regardless of the selfish pain one might feel, the sun will rise again tomorrow. You rise with it.

There is no escape. Whether you’ve lost your job, a loved one, or are facing a situation you never thought possible, there is no escape. This is it. Whatever it is. Realizing that there is no escape means accepting a situation. However that doesn’t mean giving up or giving in. Acceptance is a step necessary to move forward. You find another job, get more education, find another to love, or approach a situation from a different perspective. That is how you move forward.

I’m not sure what wisdom is exactly. Maybe it’s taking the stairs slowly when you’re missing a lung. Maybe it’s realizing that things don’t stay the same forever. Maybe it’s accepting that your hair isn’t going to grow back, you aren’t going to get younger, and you don’t have to voice everything that comes to your mind. Maybe it’s accepting that a sympathy card that isn’t personally signed is still a sympathy card.

I’m not looking to escape. I’m not looking for wisdom. I’m just getting up every day, trying to pay attention to things. Trying to be aware that this is life and I’m lucky to be experiencing it.

Image: This is a picture I took of myself entering an elevator in the parking garage off Maynard in Ann Arbor. The sun was bright, shining in a window facing the elevator on the 6th floor.