Desire for change vs. pattern

I used to blog often. But then I slowed down. Maybe because I already write a lot professionally (#AcademicLife!) and post a lot on Twitter. Writing more is not something I really need at this phase of my life. Tweeting is easy. Those are random unpolished thoughts while I am on the move. But with Elon Musk purchasing Twitter and using it as his personal toy, I often think it is time to move back to blogging. This reminds me of the time when I made the decision to quit Facebook at a time when I was using it regularly and had around 5000 friends there. I also have this GitHub-based personal site where I could blog. I am uncertain how long blogger will last as a platform for blogging, given Google's history of killing its least used platforms. For now, I will keep using blogger.

Walk to work!

 

I like change. I have lived in several cities. But I also like the little patterns in life. I often see the same persons in the building, walking in the opposite direction. They also have the pattern. We have synchronized! I arrive early to work, when it is still dark and buildings are empty. Except when it is summer, sun rises early and others become active too. Then, everyone is out early in the streets. Patterns save time. As a researcher, what we do constantly evolves. The topic I researched in 2014 isn't something I am not working on anymore. Forget 2014. Even the material from last year, once published, we moved on to the next one - maybe the next research topic in the pipeline, or an extension of the topic. It is of drastic change to how many other jobs are. Now I also teach. I see the patterns. While I review the slides, the content do not change drastically. That is pattern. That gives me some time. And space. Space to breathe and do some research.

My life goes up and down. I am random. Well. Nothing too drastic. More like, eventful-slightly boring-eventful-slightly boring-eventful-slightly boring-... Regardless of how I perceive a year, I always try to see some moments of fun, 30 things to be precise, each year, since 2010 (when I turned 23! Adulting, I think?). 2010 was fun. 2011 was slightly boring. But then 2012 and 2013 were fun. 2014 got a bit into the pattern. 2015 was fun. 2016 was a sad year. Then 2017 came. It was a crazy year. Crazy in a good way. To date, it is the year I visited the most amount of countries (16), including 9 new countries. I also lived in several cities/countries that year (Lisboa in Portugal, Louvain la Neuve and Brussels in Belgium, and Thuwal in Saudi Arabia). 2018 was boring, although it had its changes and migrations. I love migrations. It is like pumping new blood into your veins! We throw away old stuff as we leave a city and get shiny new things. 2019 was a year of celebrations. It easily became my favorite year of times. Then, came the pandemic and eternal darkness. It is easy to see how I was obsessed with 2019 for long! 2019 was also the year I left Portugal, Belgium, and Europe for good. I defended my PhD thesis, twice! Thanks, Erasmus Mundus for making my MSc and PhD journeys exciting and unique by design. 

The pandemic came. It was a weird and dark period. Loneliness. I started my life as an introvert, but I kept heading towards becoming an extrovert throughout my life. I used to describe myself as an ambivert by the time I joined my undergraduate program (2006). I tried to sit with different students/groups of students every day during my early days, making friends with students from all 25 districts. Portugal had turned me into a full extrovert. Party never ends. I was forced to be home and alone in a boring vanilla city in the Lower 48. For 2.5 years. Circumstances. I extensively blogged my pandemic survival in my COVID-19 blog series and on Twitter.

This was also the time I was thinking of what is next? I had moved from the eventful Europe, that is Lisboa, to a boring Lower 48 city. The work-from-home did not help much. I started traveling locally. I was looking for where to move next. After 4 trips to Alaska, I found myself aligned in Anchorage. In many ways, I felt Alaska represents who I am. Alaska is huge. Alaska is wild. Alaska is also quiet and calm, when it wants to be. It also transforms itself magically with brutal blizzards without notice. Alaska feels fragile and frightening - both at once to those who are unfamiliar. Alaska has space for everyone (despite its housing crisis). It is diverse. Anchorage is the most diverse city in the US, after all! After 4 years, we were back in a city where we belonged, when we moved to Anchorage in fall 2023. That was a long wait. But with the pandemic fading away in the distance (into an endemic or whatever, depending on who you ask), 2023 brought back the life which was on hold since the 2020 February. Moving to Alaska made me feel like myself again. That is huge, after gray years (2020 - 2022) in a boring Lower 48 city.

It is nice to feel home. Alaska gave me the feeling of home, which I previously had felt in Portugal. I have not visited Portugal since 2019. My first home abroad and where I spent most of my 2010s.

My beautiful bookshelf

I like traveling. I did not travel long distances since the pandemic kicked in. My last long trip was to Singapore and Bali, right before the pandemic hit the world full swing. Now, after 4.5 years, August 2024 brought me the most eventful trip of the 2020s. Anchorage ➤ Toronto ➤ Melbourne ➤ Abu Dhabi ➤ Toronto ➤ Anchorage. I made some friends. At this point, I am probably at the extreme end at the spectrum, as a true extrovert. I like meeting people. Alaska does not have many people. But it also lets you see the same people again and again. It is funny I now even remember the faces of some Anchorage airport staff. I don't know whether they remember my face though.

August started with this 15-day mega-conference trip. Together with my students, totally we had 5 papers presented! I also met many interesting people. Family, friends, new friends, and online friends. Meeting people is easy. Goodbyes are difficult. I even made friends with introverts. That feels special when an introvert becomes a friend, from being a stranger. This is in stark contrast to my recent extrovert friendships where we both burst into a tall glass of cocktail and beers with a loud "cheers, bro!" I remember the advice some of my friends gave me when I went for faculty job interviews. "Don't drink in front of the interviewers during the dinner, even if they drink. It may not affect you. But it will never be a positive thing to drink at your job interview-dinner." I don't remember the exact words. They said something along those lines. But you guessed it. I don't say no to a good drink. A beer feels good with colleagues. And that includes future colleagues, especially when it is in a fancy restaurant. "Cheers!" I said loud, clinging my beer glass with everyone else's.

The library was closed

I am very verbal. Or verbose? I am direct. And very direct. I know what I feel. And I am never shy to share what I feel. But sometimes, it is also difficult to spot a feeling. Human mind is complex. One Portuguese word I love, which is how I connect with Portugal itself. Saudade. This has been a great month. I have a recency bias. I even say this is my best month ever. Now, this great month is coming to an end. Months and years are arbitrary borders in time. Nothing really changes between August 31st and September 1st. Anyway, I felt sad for no reason. Usually, I can connect a feeling to a source. I am very self-aware of my feelings. I can explain why I feel something: sad, happy, excited, angry, lonely, or whatever. But I couldn't figure out this morning. It was 9:10 am. I decided to walk to the library. The library usually cheers me up. The library sells some overhead books for 0.50 $. I have rescued several interesting books and collected a diverse set of books in my office bookshelf.

The library was closed until 10 am. Yes, weekends - not many people come to the library. But I have a meeting to attend by 9:30 am. So I returned empty handed. Now I am sad, and I know why I am sad. It was the disappointment of a long walk where I couldn't even enter the library. I will likely return in the afternoon to fetch some books. So, that feeling will disappear. The previous unknown sadness might linger around though.

Anchorage is beautiful. The summer is coming to an end. The skies are cloudy. Days are becoming shorter. It rains. The new semester is in full swing. It is like you are standing on the footboard of a fast-running bus. An analogy that is probably unfamiliar to those outside South Asia. You hold on as the strong breeze soothes you until you reach the next stop. It is funny when people ask, "how did a Sri Lankan end up in Alaska?" I usually have to start with a "that is a long story."