A High School Reunion in a Baby Shower

 So this past long weekend, I went to ?? and ?? baby shower (though really it was just a celebration of many things) and caught up with ~10 close friends from high school as a result. It was honestly a great time - I hadn't seem some of them since pre-covid and it felt very natural, like I could just be myself around them. Especially with J - even though he's still kind of immature/wandering in life, I was really happy to just goof around with him again. They planned out a great weekend - from a fancy dinner, going to a rave and then spending a day on the lake.

It's a bit crazy to think how we've gotten old. As M said, we've known each other since we were 14 at this point and likely our trauma during high school (taking calculus tests at lunch, anyone?) bonded us together. As usual, people asked if I still kept in touch with Dez and it did make me feel somewhat sad when I said no. I'm not sure how to feel about it overall, but I do know that if you had asked me back in high school, I would've thought Dez is the one I would have remained close with rather than these other people. I'm not even sure what I'd say to her if we spoke now, I guess I'd want to just see that she's doing well and proud of the life she's living - that she's not a normie and has goals she's excited about. I've kind of accepted that it's enough to have had a positive influence on someone's life even if they are no longer there. Maybe people and relationships are just temporary or only valid for a specific time in our lives.

I think those HS years were very formative for me (and us, in general). We chatted about if we think any of our personalities had changed significantly since then and I feel the answer was mostly no. I think J is still that guy with the ego, trying too hard to impress himself and others. I think G still struggles with his place in the world even though he's crazy smart. I think G2 is still trying to be different but is not able to strict with a career. I think being consistent in your goals and who are you is a good thing in general but we should also be adaptable and willing to change - that is kind of why I respected M more to some degree after that weekend.

To explain further, I got to have a few candid/deep conversations with M when I was there and it was quite illuminating - basically how she had decided to focus more on a family rather than a career. I still feel it's like "giving up" in a sense but I think it's also self-aware to be able to re-evaluate your goals. It does feel crazy to think of these kids I grew up with as someone who are going to be parents. It was a bit different with C and V since they were already a few years older (and likely more mature) than me. But these are literally my "peers" and they are having a baby?! It seems wild to me how fast time has passed by.

I was worried/disappointed in my other HS friends though. Most of them seem very stressed (as evidenced by the copious amount of drugs I saw during the weekend) and unclear about where they were going in life. They were either going down a conventional path of work + kids (and seemed stressed by it like S) or just unsure about what to do next like G and J. None of them seemed that fulfilled with how they were spending their time day to day except maybe the main couple of the baby shower who were looking forward to this next phase of life.

I feel like in order to remain sane in this world you need a strong sense of purpose or something to strive for. And, despite how smart my high school friends are, I kind of feel like they've lost this sense of purpose over the decade or so we've been in the working world now. I don't blame them too much (but I guess I do judge them...) because it's a hard thing to remain focused. Even I'm not sure sometimes, but I do feel like they are lost in some sense. Being lost might lead to just settling in some relationship, having kids for the sake of it or even trying to mask things by alcohol or drugs (which I see in G sometimes). But, at the end of the day, they are my friends and I love them but how can I help? Maybe I need to be a better friend and keep in touch. I'm not sure.

But I did feel pretty tender/sentimental about seeing this core group again. I could feel the others did as well. I hope we can continue to keep in touch and gather like this, as I said to K in the last post, there's something to be treasured about having "old friends" who really know your story and upbringing (obviously the same goes for lovers as well). I firmly believe that who you are today in the present is not all that matters, but you need to know the entire context and thought process behind how someone evolved to who they are today. If you don't know that, then how can you say you truly know someone?

Anyway, there's probably a lot more stuff that we talked about...will try to record it here as I remember / have more time :)

A Brief Respite to Reflect at Home

 So, I guess in a continuation from my previous post, this was one of those periods where a lot happened in a few weeks. You know the saying, right...

“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.”

And indeed a lot did happen. I feel happy, in a way. Like I'm out here really living life and experiencing things. But I also feel guilty - I think I care less about my current job and I am neglecting family responsibilities a bit. 

Anyway, let's continue where I left off after the first time. I did go to the VC bbq and met up with ?? and his billionaire wife. I felt a bit awkward telling them that I decided to work for a year at ?? but I felt they were still impressed overall - but seemed skeptical that I would reach out again a year. But I do want to reach out again in a year - I think I'm at a crossroads in my life where I finally need to take the plunge and work on the research/projects I want to. The window definitely feels like it's closing.

Things also escalated pretty quickly with K, though perhaps it's more in my head. To paint a picture, I had my company offsite on Tuesday and had to wake up at like 9am. I randomly ended up having a "whiteboard" session with K until 3am in her lab where we ordered doordash and just chatted and it was...well, great. Nothing sexual or physical happened and I didn't even mention any feelings towards her - we mostly just gossiped about other people in our friend group and our own past experiences. But we touched on very deep topics such as what it means to love another person, how you might never find your 10/10 person and will likely settle, and if "normies" are really happy. I guess my POV is that I don't believe that normies are really happy at their core (normies = people who just stay on the traditional path and get married / have kids) especially if they have some amount of self-awareness.  

I didn't sleep until 5am probably and then woke up and had to survive all day at the offsite. It was rough but I did feel "alive" in some sense. I think these crazy moments and somewhat bad choices are what defines an interesting life (I suppose "bad" is not a great word here - "spontaneous" is more like it). Anyway, I crashed out to D and I at our offsite about her (I think I was probably swooning and it was cringe so I appreciate their patience, haha...) and then saw her again on Wednesday night before my 7am flight to Austin for the baby shower / high school reunion thing for the long weekend (more details on that in a later "poast")

Anyway, the point I wanted to make above is that spontaneous decisions do make you feel like you're alive but they come at a cost (ie. my sleep/health). I guess as I told D, I'm always willing to sacrifice my sleep or health for a new experience. 

But yeah...I still don't know about K. I think I just love that experience of getting to know someone deeply for the first time, when you stay up until 3am and just share your hopes and dreams. If I could do that forever, then I would. But it's like you can only experience it once with a given person (I kind of had this with S as well and it was also beautiful). So I'm not sure if I'm in love with K or just the experience. I guess there was the minor problem that she said she's kinda asexual / never felt strongly about anyone before, and the age gap is kinda sus so I really don't see it working out. She did mention that she likes "toxic" guys and kept saying how we were both toxic so I don't really know...but I should just tell her how I feel and see where it goes. I don't want to have any regrets and I actually feel kinda confident in this case that we could probably just continue being close friends unless I royally fuck things up. But maybe I'm just being flighty - I do think I have someone pretty compatible/nice in S and perhaps I've just become ensnared in the grass is always greener trap.

Honestly, it might just have been a fleeting infatuation. Cause when I hungout with her and A again in Toronto, I didn't really feel that much even though I was thinking about it in the back of my head a lot. It just felt like at 3am that it's much easier to feel chemistry with someone. Also, I basically had to hold back explosive diarrhea for 4 hours while I was hanging out so that put a damper on things (especially my abdomen).

It's weird though because I also think A and her are really good together, and I find it hard to believe she'd choose me over him (if she wanted to be with anyone at all). I'd be happy to see them together (if I was a good person) since they are both my friends and are compatible in a cultural way as well. I don't know..maybe if we hangout alone back home I'll see how I feel again and if it's just 3am bias. I do really admire her self-awareness and drive to succeed as a scientist. I also like that she challenges herself and has great mental strength.

Ohh, the another weird thing to mention is that when I was thinking about her, I kind of didn't even ?? to ??. It's like a spell was broken in some way. It's weird because she's not even that physically attractive (though when she does dress fancy it's kinda hot) especially compared to S but for the first time I understood how you could be attracted to someone even if they aren't conventionally beautiful. To be fair, I think we're probably like the same rough level of attractiveness. But it's just sometimes I see girls on insta (like B) who have these very performative (but beautiful) pictures and wonder if I want that life. But I don't really want it, I just probably lust for them in a transient anyway. I don't want to be out partying in Italy or whatever, I want to be spending my time towards either pursuing some scientific contribution, doing something creative or having a positive impact on the world.

Anyway, I should probably wrap up this post for me. I hope that, at the very least, K and I will remain close friends for a long time but I hope there's more than that to it as well. 

Oh she did as one thing when we were hanging out in Toronto, about if I'd still come back to ?? after I leave. It was kind of abrupt and I wondered why she asked. Maybe she would miss me or just feeling tender after F left as well. 

p.s. I guess she's a big reason I did the half marathon and got into running again so...there's that.

Post-Launch Thoughts

So, it's been quite hectic since I got back about a month ago but there's a bit of reprieve for now so I have time to blog again. 

In terms of work,  I was able to successfully contribute to the launch of a major AI model which I suppose was cool. I can't deny that it feels exciting to work on something that has the attention of so many people online even if didn't really live up to the colossal expectations people had for it. It also feels a bit less magical to me now that I know how the "sausage" is made and it is kind of funny to see all the wrong takes people have about how the model was trained on Twitter/LinkedIn for example.

Anyway, the weeks leading up the launch were pretty stressful - a lot of 1am nights in the office though, at the time, I didn't really mind so much. In fact, I felt a sense of camaraderie because other folks were working very hard as well. I'm also grateful that leadership recognized that we were working pretty hard and gave us a week off to relax (it's Saturday night at 3am here and I have one more day before I go back again...).

I am a bit concerned about my overall performance at work, I guess I have my first official review sometime in the next few weeks. Also slightly concerned about what to work on next - as I said in a previous post, I really don't want to just keep being a wagie though. Hopefully I can just do this until next spring/summer and then pursue my own startup or independent research full-time. I think I need to take initiative to build out the life I want to live instead of just being swept away by the current. That being said, I'm not particularly unhappy right now or anything - it is a good time to be at an AI company and perhaps this can make me even more financial secure in the future. At any rate, I think it's an interesting experience to literally be working to build the technology that is probably the hottest thing in the world right now. And I do believe that, in a fundamental sense, life is about collecting experiences.

I was feeling a bit hard on myself during these 4-5 days off about being "swept in the current" because I didnt really accomplish much. I just went to the gym, hungout with friends (drank with K/A/J and M until 3am and did karaoke) and then played pickleball. While it was undoubtedly fun, there was a lingering thought in the back of my mind that I should have been spending my time more wisely. What about finishing my HS novella? What about writing in general? What about watching more lectures about diffusion models? 

But perhaps this idea of always optimizing your time is just a trap. Maybe I did need some time to just reset and not do anything intellectual. Though my ideal life is probably one where I don't feel burnt out just doing research because I'm genuinely interested in it - and can just keep pursuing that. On the other hand, I dont want to be like our other unemployed friend M, whose life seems far too aimless - she just wakes up at 2pm every day and just has dinner / hangs out with friends with no real overall goal. I don't want to be like that, I'd rather steer more in the opposite direction (grinding too hard and over optimizing my time) but I should recognize that a happy medium exists.

Anyway, I think that's it for the work front. My takeaway is probably to continue with writing even if I don't feel motivated because it should be a "different" kind of creativity (ie. than research at work) and I think I'm just being lazy. I owe to my past selves to put in an effort to finish this novella and try to get it out into the world - especially because I do end up enjoying writing once I make the effort to start doing it.

On the relationship side, I thought I'd spend more time with S during the break but the day we were going to hangout her mom ended up having a minor stroke and she was in the ER with her. I was surprised how tender I felt about this, for the first time, I would have liked to go to the hospital and be there to support her/her family even though I didn't. I did genuinely pray for her mom to get better though and I told her that. Idk, it's a weird feeling, but it's one of the rare times I felt like I wanted to be part of her family and support her on a deeper level. Maybe this means I really do care more than I think? I guess it was also a green flag for me to see that she takes responsibility for her parents and cares about them (at least her mom).

But, I've also been spending a lot of time with K and A lately. I invited K to work badminton events and we went to multiple concerts over the past several weeks (Lady Gaga and then Keshi). I'm really grateful to have met her and A, because I feel like they've pushed me to do these new experiences (like the west coast trip and going to concerts) that I would not have otherwise. I feel like this is the first time since post-COVID where I'm really doing a lot of new things from a social POV and having fun as well.

The (baby) elephant in the room is if I like K as more than a friend though? She's much younger than me (probably like 6 years) which is a bit strange and also I do feel like she's at a different stage in life (phd student). Nonetheless, we do joke about eventually ending up in Boston together and I feel that if I was also younger and in academia (the dream is if I was doing my PhD at Stanford and met her) then she'd be near perfect for me. We've never really talked about (our own) relationships whether in the past or current, maybe it's something I should bring up anyway (with A also) if I really want to get closer to her. It is a bit strange that we seem like such "close" friends but don't talk about our own relationships - maybe that's just the Gen Z mentality of not caring that much about sex/relationships but I'm not sure. Anyway...things to think about in the future.

I think that's all for now! Tomorrow is the VC barbecue with C so I'm curious to see how that goes. I'm a bit worried about work but hopefully it'll be fine and I can survive these next 6 months while still learning things that will be useful for my startup / research later on. Along with being more directed with my time with regards to writing / going to the gym even. Is life really just a wheel that keeps turning indefinitely? Is control just an illusion...?