In Estonia [Older Fragment]

I’m reading the mails of my team, as if this was any other evening in my life, as if it didn’t matter anymore where or with whom I was – only determined by and limited to what I had taken on as a responsibility. I watch the snowflakes dance and listen to Marjams voice telling a fairytale to her son in a language I will never understand.

We had talked about happiness, about ambition, about ability and how life can sometimes cross your plans and throw you offtrack in a way that you will never be the same person again. Her tea tasted like sun while outside winter was claiming the city.

It will be... right?

Early bird

As I recently went to extremes in my over a decade established habit to go to bed later and later and coming to the conclusion that 10 AM is NOT a time to go to bed and 3.30 PM NOT a time to get up, I decided to break my habit by force and skip a night of sleep in order to be so tired that I will be able to comply to a normal time schedule.

So, after almost falling asleep over an important mail, unable to grasp my own sentences, opening my eyes and figuring out that half of the mail contains the phrase "öööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööööö" because I my hand rested there when my eyes closed last, I close my laptop at exactly 10 PM and set my alarm clock to a reasonable time, providing enough recovery from the lack of one night of sleep and getting me up early enough for starting a nice early day. I immediately fall asleep.

When I open my eyes again I'm immediately awake.
I lie there for a moment, unable to believe this feeling even though just having slept. It is still dark outside. I'm confused about what to do.
"Well", I think, "take the chance or let it be" and have a look at the time.
It's exactly 5.30 AM. I had slept exactly 7,5 hours.
I remember studies saying that a sleeping phase takes 1,5 hours and I'm astonished by this exact compliance of my body.
"Hm", I think and don't know what to do.
It's too early to start working on anything or going to the office, too early to eat breakfast, too late to chat with anybody and I don't have any kind of morning practise in that term, too cold to go running. So I decide reading a bit, while observing myself and looking for signs of being only accidentally and temporarily in such a fresh state.
I'm not very concentrated.

After an hour of reading, I turn on my computer, check my mails, surf around in the internet, discover a new tool and play around with it a bit.

The first light of the morning crawls over the roof of the Cathederal of St. Stephan that I can see from my window. Usually that is a sign for me to hurry up finishing my stuff and going to bed. Now I'm confused experiencing the same sensation even though it's a new day.

A good friend is online. He writes "Early to bed, early to rise - keeps a man healthy, wealthy and wise". Let's see about that.

It's 7.30 when I decide to start the "real" day and go to have a shower. When I'm finished I meet my flatmate, who reacts with a tired and completely puzzled look to my cheerful "Good morning, Hannes! What a wonderful new day, eh?". I start talking about how good it is, to rise early, be a productive member of society and comply to the system with a slightly ironic undertone. After 15 minutes of doing so my flatmates says "I don't know, if it's really a good thing that you wake up so early..." and laughs.
I'm still confused about how to structure my day now. When should I eat? Obviously I needed to get back to the classical 3-meal-structure. When should I sleep? That is a harder question and I postpone answering it to the evening.

When I arrive at the office at 8.45 there is nobody there. Of course.
I always enjoy working alone in the nights, now I experience the same for the morning. I thought it would be harder to get myself into this.
The doorbell rings, the post-woman gives me a letter. She also looks a bit surprised. Then she asks "Are you always here at that time of the day?". "Well, from 10 AM onwards we should be here, but I'm here a bit earlier today." I say and smile.

I sit down at my desk and greet the new working day.
My alarm clock rings. It was set to 9 AM.
I smile and start working.

Against the pride of the titans

He sat at his desk as he had sat at the table in his classroom back then when the world was not bigger than the small town he had lived in somewhere in the countryside.
There were several piles of papers without any significant mark of order spread around his laptop before him, which might have been of importance - or not.
He was sitting slackly in his chair, the hands resting on the keyboard of his notebook - ready to send out whatever thought worthwile sharing struck his mind.
But he did not feel like there was anything worthwile in his head. Instead he felt a faint echo of the restlessness that smote him from time to time ever since the big doubts had been muted by a dull aloofness whose nature he could neither name nor grasp.
He was reading an e-mail explaining in an angry, imperious style what he needed to improve at something he had written the day before. Most of the points were at a closer look not really valid, but he opened the file and started making smaller adjustements.

[...]

He closed the mail and started gathering additional materials he would need to attach to the document. His movements were impassionate, his thoughts slow, as if they were making their way to his consciousness through thick mucus.
"Something is not ok", he thought and there was no concern in this thought. "There has to be a pattern", he tried to continue, "a pattern of being human, which needs to be identified in order to understand what is going on in my head". He thought of the connections in his head, of the constellation of experiences and their interpretation, of the neurological explanations for consciousness. There was the key, he told himself. It needs to be mapped out, he thought, thoroughly and completely, to be understood, to be made accessible, to make it applicable. "No", he heard his voice, while focussed again on his task , "No, that is not important right now. That is not priority. It does not bring you nearer to the goals you are pursuing, the goals you set by dedicating yourself towards what you are doing right now." He dimly felt how the thought vanished with the awkward feeling of resentment against the inaccessible depth it had conveyed. He did not feel like chasing the ghosts of possible interconnections in the world. There was not the time for digging into the unknown.
He suddenly sat straight. What had he just thought?
If one would have looked into his eyes, he would have seen his usual glance of incomprehensible perceptiveness just with a slight feature of looking inwards - but the sensation which he actually had was blank terror.
He had condemned curiosity and stopped digging deeper where he would have needed to use the sharpness of his mind and not just his intuition. He had denied the possibility of a new knowledge for the sake of focussing on what he was told was absolutely necessary for success.
Success of what?
He rose from his chair and started packing his belongings as if he was trying to escape not from his desk but from something it represented. "Something is wrong", he repeated over and over again in his mind, "Something is terribly wrong!".

[...]

Do schools today kill creativity?

Sir Ken Robinson makes an entertaining (and profoundly moving) case for creating an education system that nurtures creativity, rather than undermining it. With ample anecdotes and witty asides, Robinson points out the many ways our schools fail to recognize - much less cultivate - the talents of many brilliant people.

Some Quotes:
"We are educating people out of their creativity"

"Children are not afraid to be wrong. Allow me to say that being wrong is the same as being creative. What we do know is that if you are not prepared to be wrong you will never come up with something original. By the time children become adults they are frightened to be wrong"

"All educational systems came into being to meet the need of industrialism"

"Many highly talented, brilliant highly creative people think they are not. Because they think what they were good at at school wasn't valued or was actually stigmatised. And I think we can't afford to go on that way"

Status Report

Despite original assumptions, extensive tests throughout the last few years couldn't proof the possession of any supernatural powers.
The experiment will be continued until final conclusions can be made.

A new morning

As the first light of the morning starts banishing the darkness of the night, the battle is over.
"For years I have waited for this moment!" he says and I can almost feel his invisible grim smile.
"Just look into your heart. Just read everything you wrote in the past years - It was there all along!
In your dreams you tore apart what they made you do!
The thousand faces in your stories all belong to the same hero you want to become!
You always knew it.
Listen to my words!
Your time is now!
You are ready!"

I don't feel ready.
I feel sad.
My hands glide over my face as if they want to take of a mask. Or put one on.

He is right.
The sun rises and blinds me as I welcome the new morning.
I don't shed a tear, although I feel like doing so.

My time is now.