Default Settings

Its been a while. I’m still trying to recover from a 65 hour work week the week before. I slacked a little this week after a just-when-things-were-warming-up game of scrabble at The Fat Badger for Saturday brunch and a time-flies-so-fast weekend.

This weekend was a swirl of blurred faces, both old and new, having my head stuck in a plastic bag for half an hour, getting whacked in the face with a tennis racket, a short trip to see an exhibition at The AA, Korean brunch in a dingy basement surrounded by Korean videos tapes and farewell drinks with ET. All this blended with a pinch of happiness, a teaspoon of melancholy and a tablespoon of apprehension.

I am finally sitting down in front of my laptop to catch up with everything around me after a jog in Hyde Park, sun salutations, washing and ironing my bed sheets and fretting over a blown light bulb. Yo Yo Ma’s The Cello Suites is playing in the background c/o the-one-who-whacked-me-in-the-face-with-a-tennis-racket-ex-house-guest. I am just about to switch to listern to my default setting favourite Couch and adjusting my eyes to the darkness sitting beside my light-bulb-less lamp. I feel like a pianist about to attempt a Stravinsky. There is so much I want to say, but am afraid that it will likely come out as a catastrophic disaster. When you start something, you never know what the outcome is. Be it work, friendship, love and even baking a cake.

I read with great interest A’s recent Blog Entry. ‘A’ must be for Analyze with a capital A and I must just be Miss La La in her own dream land. I lost myself in the maze of his thoughts but I g0t the drift after a couple of repeated readings. We had a short conversation last night during ET’s farewell drinks. And he brought up a good point which is remotely linked to all this jumbled self flagellation.

A, I know of very few Architects around us who knew for sure that Architecture was what they wanted to do for the rest of their lives. Those few who do, I must say are extremely privileged. It is not so much the definition of Architecture that is up for debate as Architecture is defined by ourselves and what we want out of it and how we want to contribute to it. In that aspect, I can give you very little comment.

To be fair, I asked myself the same questions over and over, especially now, in a prestigious architectural office only to realize that this does not necessarily mean personal or even professional success. Like the primitives who wanted so much to believe that the sun and moon were gods, I still want to believe that Architecture is my destiny and not a default setting. This does not mean that I do not like Architecture, but is it enough to make a life out of? More so, is it important at all?

In the past year, I have been unable to practice Architecture in the way I knew and learnt to. And this taught me two things:

1. By not being able to do the things that I use to be able to do, I now know which aspects of Architecture I like.
2. By not finding full satisfaction in work, I have turned to other outlets to nourish my soul. And I forgot I could because Architecture can be such a self-absorbed, all encompassing profession.

My failures have thought me more things then my success. As age catches up with me, my patience runs shorter. I have started analyzing a tiny bit less, but to learn to trust my base instincts a bit more ( like you said I should last night). Of what makes me sad and what makes me happy. I admit I am old enough to know that I can’t always have the best of both worlds and sacrifices/ hardships as well as chimp tactics are necessary for whatever outcomes to get me to where I hope to get to eventually.

Full Moon aka C told me before that to be able to practice Architecture is a privilege. When the going gets tough and doubts begin to fill my head. I remember this. Just like the things I had taken for granted before and lost, if we view everything from work, friendships, family, love with fragility, just like I view each day in London as my possible last day, I am able to live life a little fuller and with a bit more love and a bit more tenderness.

So A, when the going gets tough, remember this. You can still Analyze with a capital A, but get dirty in the mud, eat nuts and climb trees. You never know what could be up another tree.

Oh and make more babies.