Bookshelf update: Randy Pausch & Robert Crais

This will be quick. I'm 3/4 of the way through Randy Pausch's book version of The Last Lecture, and calling it inspiring is like calling grass green. The very act of writing it was inspiring; the end product could hardly help but be so. It really is a good read, though. Pausch emerges as a quirky, three-dimensional character for the ages, a self-professed recovering jerk whose intellectual arrogance is thoroughly undermined by his deep loyalty to his family and belief that some vital part of the secret of life lies in striving to achieve your childhood dreams. If Peter Pan had grown up to be a computer scientist with terminal cancer, he might have written this book.

The other thing that led me to post today was Robert Crais, whose Elvis Cole series is among my very favorite reads, and who just published a typically smart, witty, multilayered and purposeful essay about his own creative process, in the form of an imagined conversation between himself and Cole. If you aren't already a fan of this series and are curious about it, give this a read and see if it doesn't tempt you to pick up one of the books.

Life at warp speed

It's been some time since I blogged here, and -- fair warning -- may be some time yet. Somehow even in the most predictable of circumstances, life around the holidays assumes greater velocity. And circumstances today -- a new job starting January 5, three kids finishing finals this week and coming home for break, our good friends' annual Christmas party, etc., etc. -- include both the predictable and the life-changing. Where it's all heading right now is anybody's guess, but as usual the challenge is to stay in the moment and try to navigate your path with some element of grace and presence. When you're moving at warp speed, the laws of physics have a tendency to break down... but you're still making memories.