I'm thinking of asking for 4 day a week, spend 1 day a week doing my own
thing, or
nothing, just have more time to think and do whatever I want. It's so
acceptable to drop say 30k on a new car if you want and noone will
question you,
but if your particular desire happens to be 'free time' and you switch
to part
time everyone things you've gone mental. It's a crazy materialistic world we live in, but I'm thankful for it, because if everyone was like me there would be a lot more people relaxing, and a lot less goods being produced, perhaps leading to high prices. Or it might work the other way, if everyone was like me they might spend that relaxing time looking for new ideas and opportunities and trying things out, hacking things together, learning new things and perhaps, just perhaps some people smarter than me would be producing new and innovative things out of that free time leading to a wealthier society and cheaper goods and services for all.
Saturday, March 1, 2014
The old man.
Yesterday my good friend G had a heart attack, today he had a stroke, signs are looking grim, he will pass away shortly. I don't want to forget G so I will write a few words here so his life and character may live on anonymously.
G was quite a bit older than me, and he worked with me, but he was not a father figure, he was not a colleague, he was my friend. I first met him at a work drinks event, he was buying a round of drinks for a large group of friends, laughing and enjoying. It was shortly after that when he took up a seat next to me at work I started to get to know him better. We would have tea breaks every day and talk about anything and everything. Unfortunately this led to him being shipped off to another team for about 3 years but eventually he was returned to us.
In the beginning he was a vegetarian, but sometimes he would say 'i'm vegetarian but today i'm going to eat chicken'. This would be an endless source of laughter and jokes for us. Eventually he gave up his vegetarianism, only to reclaim it just months ago before his heart attack.
G wasn't the greatest software developer but we all wanted him back in our team due to the happiness he brought with him. Everyone knows those people that are cold hearted, manipulative, two faced and always playing politics but G was the complete opposite, he was warm, kind hearted, genuine and caring. I wonder if it was the stress of work that got him, he tried hard but kept getting bad performance reviews that really hurt him and stressed him out.
G looks like a quiet introverted shy guy, but he is actually quite well travelled and has taken some adventurous gambles. He spent a year or so working in Japan. He also worked in Saudi Arabia and made a lot of money over there. He spent some time in America and Canada before moving to Sydney. In Sydney he bought a Internet cafe of all things! He later sold it at a loss, at which point his wife decided it was best for them to have separate accounts - we would tease G to no end about this.
He bought and sold several properties, some at a profit some just breaking even one thing is for sure, he was never afraid to take risks.
Shortly after I first met him, I gave him a rusty old car, it was hilariously bad but he took it and made use of it for about 6 months. One time he told me he picked up some important people in that car and it was raining, everyone complained about getting wet.
Recently he bought a home for almost 800000 and spent his holidays renovating it. This is slow laborious work for an old man but he did it with love and the results were quite amazing. When I was renovating my apartment of course he stepped in and helped me paint the whole place and in return he asked for nothing.
G was always donating money to anyone and everyone. He was supporting several people back in his home country with cash and other aid. God help those people now, who will support them?
He would tell me about his problems at home, and give me advice on dating and life, we would discuss property, finance, religion, food, sports, work, office politics and of course girls on our almost daily lunchtime adventures. He is one of the few people I knew that could almost eat as much as me. If we went out for pizza most people would share a pizza between 3 people, but G and I would always order one each and would always joke about how little the others were eating.
He had an incredible ability to tell a bad joke and laugh hysterically at his wit(or often lack of!), he would often be on his own at the start of his infectious uproarious laugh, but by the end nobody could resist laughing with him, and also quite often at him though always in good humour.
G and I had grand plans to drive across USA, to drive across Australia, to go camping. He was looking forward to his retirement, planing to downsize, travel around his home country, and enjoy the fruits of his life of labour. He won't get to enjoy any of that now, it's a shame he didn't take more time to enjoy it all a little earlier.
I just had lunch with him on Thursday, we went to a Sri Lankan restaurant and we both had delicious thali's, I ordered an extra serving of 2 rotis , we were meant to split it 1-1 however I ate 1.5 and he had 0.5. I spent a lot of timing complaining that I've been moved to a different office (in the city) from Monday, how insignificant and trivial that complaint seems now.
He had started to develop a funny old man habit, anytime you would say anything to him he would first respond with 'huh?' and if you weren't careful you'd end up repeating everything twice! I pointed this out to him on Thursday and joked that he needed to get his ears checked, we had a good laugh!
There's so much more I want to say but my mind is not able to recall it, how quickly we forget, how easy it is to ignore all the wonderful, little moments we have and pass them off as insignificant. Grand plans for the future are not the stuff, huge momentous occasions are not the stuff, it's all the little things, they are the real stuff of life. That's what we should remember but that's the stuff that gets forgotten. That is what I'm hoping to capture here it seems mundane and trivial but that's how it was. It's interesting that we have so many friendships that come and go, most of the time people just drift apart it's a slow painless process. The end result is the same, you lose a friend, but when it happens so suddenly, when you aren't ready for it to be gone, it is a sudden jarring painful traumatising experience.
G was quite a bit older than me, and he worked with me, but he was not a father figure, he was not a colleague, he was my friend. I first met him at a work drinks event, he was buying a round of drinks for a large group of friends, laughing and enjoying. It was shortly after that when he took up a seat next to me at work I started to get to know him better. We would have tea breaks every day and talk about anything and everything. Unfortunately this led to him being shipped off to another team for about 3 years but eventually he was returned to us.
In the beginning he was a vegetarian, but sometimes he would say 'i'm vegetarian but today i'm going to eat chicken'. This would be an endless source of laughter and jokes for us. Eventually he gave up his vegetarianism, only to reclaim it just months ago before his heart attack.
G wasn't the greatest software developer but we all wanted him back in our team due to the happiness he brought with him. Everyone knows those people that are cold hearted, manipulative, two faced and always playing politics but G was the complete opposite, he was warm, kind hearted, genuine and caring. I wonder if it was the stress of work that got him, he tried hard but kept getting bad performance reviews that really hurt him and stressed him out.
G looks like a quiet introverted shy guy, but he is actually quite well travelled and has taken some adventurous gambles. He spent a year or so working in Japan. He also worked in Saudi Arabia and made a lot of money over there. He spent some time in America and Canada before moving to Sydney. In Sydney he bought a Internet cafe of all things! He later sold it at a loss, at which point his wife decided it was best for them to have separate accounts - we would tease G to no end about this.
He bought and sold several properties, some at a profit some just breaking even one thing is for sure, he was never afraid to take risks.
Shortly after I first met him, I gave him a rusty old car, it was hilariously bad but he took it and made use of it for about 6 months. One time he told me he picked up some important people in that car and it was raining, everyone complained about getting wet.
Recently he bought a home for almost 800000 and spent his holidays renovating it. This is slow laborious work for an old man but he did it with love and the results were quite amazing. When I was renovating my apartment of course he stepped in and helped me paint the whole place and in return he asked for nothing.
G was always donating money to anyone and everyone. He was supporting several people back in his home country with cash and other aid. God help those people now, who will support them?
He would tell me about his problems at home, and give me advice on dating and life, we would discuss property, finance, religion, food, sports, work, office politics and of course girls on our almost daily lunchtime adventures. He is one of the few people I knew that could almost eat as much as me. If we went out for pizza most people would share a pizza between 3 people, but G and I would always order one each and would always joke about how little the others were eating.
He had an incredible ability to tell a bad joke and laugh hysterically at his wit(or often lack of!), he would often be on his own at the start of his infectious uproarious laugh, but by the end nobody could resist laughing with him, and also quite often at him though always in good humour.
G and I had grand plans to drive across USA, to drive across Australia, to go camping. He was looking forward to his retirement, planing to downsize, travel around his home country, and enjoy the fruits of his life of labour. He won't get to enjoy any of that now, it's a shame he didn't take more time to enjoy it all a little earlier.
I just had lunch with him on Thursday, we went to a Sri Lankan restaurant and we both had delicious thali's, I ordered an extra serving of 2 rotis , we were meant to split it 1-1 however I ate 1.5 and he had 0.5. I spent a lot of timing complaining that I've been moved to a different office (in the city) from Monday, how insignificant and trivial that complaint seems now.
He had started to develop a funny old man habit, anytime you would say anything to him he would first respond with 'huh?' and if you weren't careful you'd end up repeating everything twice! I pointed this out to him on Thursday and joked that he needed to get his ears checked, we had a good laugh!
There's so much more I want to say but my mind is not able to recall it, how quickly we forget, how easy it is to ignore all the wonderful, little moments we have and pass them off as insignificant. Grand plans for the future are not the stuff, huge momentous occasions are not the stuff, it's all the little things, they are the real stuff of life. That's what we should remember but that's the stuff that gets forgotten. That is what I'm hoping to capture here it seems mundane and trivial but that's how it was. It's interesting that we have so many friendships that come and go, most of the time people just drift apart it's a slow painless process. The end result is the same, you lose a friend, but when it happens so suddenly, when you aren't ready for it to be gone, it is a sudden jarring painful traumatising experience.
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