Lessons from the Stone Age

This last week I watched spring unfold by the hour, stood in a creek on a sunny day, met up with old friends, dug in the ground, ate lots of pizza, and reflected…

My one week sabbatical

Logging off…

An hour after closing my computer, a decade of workplace minutiae left my mind. All of a sudden, I had excess RAM and CPU to allocate to… anything! For the next week, I was free.

Literally this

Free to do anything. Free to do nothing. My one commitment to myself was that I would write a post to memorialize this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

This was also a commitment to a long-time mentor and friend who asked me to summarize the top 3-5 things I learned from my recent job experience.

Human author note: This post is 99% ‘organic’. I did not use generative AI, but I did use spill check.

Project Pangea

I could not not work for an entire week.

The best part of sabbatical was getting to work on what I wanted to do: Project Pangea.

A majority of my professional career has consisted of sitting inside, looking at a computer, doing one of those jobs you describe and people say 'oh nice' and then gracefully change the subject of conversation.

For my sabbatical, I went back to the stone ages. I acquired a literal ton of flagstone and spent the week outdoors working with my hands and the earth.

My first deliverable was a footpath. Some finishing touches remain, but one week later the path is in the ground!

Project Pangea, Update 1

Project Pangea, Update 2

Lessons from this project

Learn from your mistakes

I jumped right in and started carving up earth around the first stone. In the process of doing so, I moved a few of the other stones so I could get a better angle at the soil with my trowel.

Alrighty, first slab of topsoil successfully extracted, first stone in the ground. On to the second stone… Oh man, where was the second stone located??

I spent a solid 30 minutes reconfiguring the stones to their maybe-original arrangement. After that, I remembered to take pictures before moving anything. Lesson learned.

Pattern Matching

Irregular flagstone is a fun medium because it forces you to be creative and embrace imperfection. No two stones are identical, but there are a few common flavors:

Lighting bolts/ ‘DFA’
Vermont/ New Hampshires
Nevadas/ Straight edges
Books
Slightly rounded books
Big boys
Triangles
Cleavers/ thinnies/ throwaways

A real indie rock label

Certain combinations work and look great together, like a pizza slice and a Vermont rotated 90-degrees:

Once I had my stone library organized, I could make adjustments and plug-in stones on-the-fly. It’s just like getting your teams organized and placing people in a role where they can do their best work.

Usability first

You can build a very creative-looking path, but it must feel natural to walk on for a range of people with different gait mechanics, in a variety of conditions (carrying groceries, running to the ice cream truck, walking the dog, pushing a wheelbarrow, etc.).

If people prefer to walk to the side of your path, your path is not a path. (Check out this TED talk on desire paths).

That said, we will see if a new path emerges next to my flagstone installation in a few months.

Pace yourself

It took me about an hour per step. That sounds like a snail’s pace, and maybe it is, but it was my pace.

It was also 90 degrees and sunny, and my climate-controlled office disposition is not accustomed to such challenging conditions.

Either way, I think the lesson here is to find wins along the way and keep moving forward.

Also counter-stretching. I was hunched over on my hands and knees, exerting pressure on my wrists.

After every step, I would do an upside down turtle, cow/ cat, and lots of weird back stretches to try to prevent injury. I apologize to my neighbors.

The project is in a good place and I feel limber. This was a successful week. Sometimes you need to set your ego aside and take care of yourself, whatever that looks like. Maybe that’s the biggest lesson of all.

Field Notes

Additional highlights and reflections from last week

When was the last time you pondered a flower?*

April in upstate New York falls into three categories:

This last week was literally sunshine and rainbows. Overnight showers, 70 - 90 degree days, sunset after 8pm.

The perfect stage for spring to spring before your eyes.

Every morning a new surprise awaited.

Crocuses retired
Forsythia turned green
Tulips arrived overnight
And the lilacs!
Buds on the dogwood
Hyssop and wildflowers returning in a big way
Dandelions
Rhododendron

*This question - 'when was the last time you pondered a flower?' - comes from one of my favorite artists, Griz, who shared his reflections and advice after returning from hiatus last year.

What I read

Honestly, not much.

Reading is effectively putting someone else’s thoughts into your brain. This is a healthy and important intellectual exercise. However, one of the intentions I set for my sabbatical was to see where my own train of thoughts would go with space and time to wonder and wander.

Outside of sabbatical, I have been reading The New Yorker.

What I love about The New Yorker is you could be reading a 10,000 word investigative piece on a serious topic like prison reform, and in the middle of the article they have a cartoon with two cats wearing cowboy hats.

You start thinking in New Yorker cartoons. In the spirit of Project Pangea, I tried my hand at a making a few stone-themed cartoons:

There is a design exercise I love called ‘crazy eights’. You take 8 minutes to produce 8 different ideas/ design hypotheses and see what emerges. This exercise is a reminder that your mind is a boundless treasure box.

From Doechii: “If I am a product of the original Creator and He has an unlimited supply of creative energy; That means I have access to an unlimited supply of creative energy..."

Conversations I had

“My dad’s name is Todd” - Broad-sweeping conversation with a long-lost friend/ bartender. We covered everything from soil health and alt-grains, to the best bagel in New Jersey, to carving out a resilient/ durable/ useful path in life. We joked about suburban life and 'office hands'. I also did my first shot ski.

Stewardship

This bartender was not an employee, not an owner, but a steward for his century-old establishment. More than anything, he wanted to preserve the legacy of hospitality his forebears created. That mentality is how institutions survive across generations. Take care of people and the rest will follow.

“The story of wine is the story of colonialism” - A different bartender (at a different bar) explained how colonial forces grew European grape varieties in the Americas. He also explained that there is a whole world of ‘off the beaten vine’ options that are more native/ naturalized to the terroir of the Americas. I failed to write down any specifics, but this is a research trail I am excited to go down.

Wild and exotic ←→ Precise and practical

That same bartender was also very into Ducati and BMW motorcycles, and explained how Italy and Germany both have exceptionally high quality and exacting standards for engineering, but bring a different philosophy to their products. An MBA at heart, I can not wait to use ‘wild and exotic’ in a 2x2 matrix in the near future.

What I watched

What I listened to

If I wanted to impress the four people who read this far, I would share these two album covers and call this section a wrap...

But if you are still reading, you deserve to know the full truth…

Top songs from Spotify this week

See Myself by Geese
Semi-Charmed Life by Third Eye Blind
Every Morning by Sugar Ray
The Love Club by Lorde
Cowboy Nudes by Geese

But if I had to pick one top track from sabattical...

‘One Week’ by the Barenaked Ladies

(I have a history of taking off my shirt...)

What I ate

Jersey Mike’s (Kingston has awesome local sandwiches, but we just got a JM’s and I could not be more excited. If I am being transparent, this is just a well disguised affiliate post for Jersey Mike's, A Sub Above)
Oysters, along with a discussion of how important (and f###ked) our oceans are, aquaculture, and my hero Sylvia Earle.
An air-fried quesadilla. Taco Bell call me if you want to talk IP.
Tots
Radishes, asparagus, snap peas, chicories. SPRING!!
Pizza pizza pizza
Orange wine, Rosé Champagne, Miller High Life

What I learned (condensed version)

Act with intention/ Be curious/ Always be prompting (not just AI)
Wonder with curiosity/ Seek feedback/ Always be prototyping
Guide with clarity and compassion/ Take care of others/ Take care of your customers

What I have yet to learn

I had a glimmer of what I call ‘Level 2’ relaxation this last week.

I would describe Level 1 relaxation as feeling at ease both physically and mentally. There might be thoughts that pop into your head, but they do not dominate your consciousness for very long, they pass by like a cloud in the sky.

Find 15 - 30 minutes of quiet time and you can get to Level 1. You can even build up some muscle and take Level 1 to go, so you can meditate on the train, in meetings, at the grocery store, etc.

Level 2 relaxation is intense. You can feel energy flowing inward from the universe. It took three days in the mountains, digital detox, standing in a brook for hours, a couple sauna sessions, and a zero stress environment to experience a moment of Level 2 relaxation. I am not sure if I will get there again.

I think it was a teaser for retirement.

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