Journal : OpenRoadWorks

She is irrestible to me. For all those that know me, they know that I mad about my girlfriend. Mad is the operative word, as I enter a different state when her voice beckons me. Come rain or shine, good sense and bad scents, she is there at my side, co-collaborateur and sidekick. A point of harassment, a word of encouragement - all these things are part of our normal dialogues that carry on and on and on. I cannot get enough, even when she uses her special expressions that defy standard english convention. Her fluency becomes my language, as slowly her expressions seep into mine. Soon, I am changed and speaking in tongues; later, I will be dancing in my dreams with the girl that charms me. Talking to my baby is fun and nourishing - her words will carry me to sleep and those wonderful dreams...

Before I knew it, I was back in the office for another week of strategies and business models. From the nostalgia of bygone-era social clubs to the not-yet-imagined world of future technologies, I am zooming in between rapid-fire moments that rush by like the wind. I would have thought that a year abroad at one of the most intense graduate programs in the world would be enough to make me settle into a "simpler life", but that daydream was not meant to be. It's just a matter of facing reality, that life continues to exert its inexplicable control over stresses and delights and that define passing moments. The thought is too much for a Monday morning, but it does beg the question - whatever happened to the weekend?

After a bit of travel and work-a-day life, I am back for a weekend in the city. Of all the places that I have been that evoke urban living, there is still nothing quite like Manhattan. With its serpentine avenues that carve out through tall buildings like grand canyons and shabby chic neighborhoods that feel strangely familiar from countless scenes in television and film, the city is always inviting for the next adventure. This time, it is a classic New York wedding at the University Club, surrounded by turn-of-the-century splendor and high society social climbers - F. Scott Fitzgerald would be collecting pages of field notes for likely sequel to "The Great Gatsby". Perhaps I am too romantic in my view of this place that I used to call home; after all, the temperatures have dropped, and I have not been able to enjoy as much of the city as I usually do lurking indoors. Still, a return to this fabled place reminds me of the memories that I have accumulated here and the days...

Once upon a time, the pen was my albatross. Come hell or high water, I would don my writing cap to craft a day's worth of dispatch to a global readership interested in the mundane business of management studies. I had no time, I was far removed from anything related to the "real world" (although my studies were "real world, real learning"), and I was chronically fatigued. Still, that old foe time made room for my elusive friend inspiration and voila' - a daily diary entry was born. Just one year, and I can look back to see my work sitting idle on the back pages of a graduate school website as a reminder of what I used to do. This evening, I sit in quietude, soaking in a new life and re-setting my habits and thought patterns for another life. I have crossed the chasm of my youth, headstrong into adulthood and carrying a whole new set of expectations for myself. I am refocusing, and (relatively) I have all the time in the world. However, I don't seem to f...