The light does not shine forever...

Admit it. One cannot remain in the limelight forever. Everyone has their temporary sojourn in the hall of fame, after which they would have to relinquish their baton the next Johnny-come-lately. One cannot stay perched on top of the pecking order forever. Professional decline generally happens in all professions, some earlier than the others. Athletes commence their declines quite early, whereas teachers, writers and researchers lose it much later. Peak performances of many professionals rarely happen at an advanced age.

Not everyone takes the dimming of the spotlight gracefully.

Charles Darwin 1809-1882

Charles Darwin was just 27 when he returned on the Beagle with his discoveries in botany and zoology. From that time, for the next 30 years, he was the go-to scientist who published the famous 'On the Origin of Species'. After 50, Darwin hit a brick wall. Not keeping up with mathematical calculations that were so important in later researches, he became irrelevant and depressed.

On the other hand, Johann Sebastian Bach was also a musical prodigy early in his career. New artistic trends and excellent classical compositions by his children (Carl Phillipe and Johann Christian) made his Baroque-style music passè. Instead of plunging into melancholy, Johann Bach became an instructor and diverted his attention to other areas. He enjoyed the prestige.

Cognitive and performance decline is inevitable after a certain age. The question is whether one is going to embrace it like Darwin or like Bach? Be like Darwin, and you will be the grumpy old man who whines about everything and sings praises of the good old days. Be a Bach, spread your wisdom to the younger generation and be a hip and happy senior citizen.


REF: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/work-peak-professional-decline/590650/

(P.S. Apparently there are two concepts of intelligence, the fluid and the crystalline one. The fluid intelligence is the raw intellectual horsepower that reasons, analyse and solve novel problems. It is abundant in innovators and entrepreneurs. It peaks early in adulthood only to diminish after the 30s and 40s. Crystalline intelligence, in comparison, involves the ability to use past knowledge. As knowledge increases with age, historians, writers and poets find their voices late in life.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Time or money?

thechive.files.wordpress.com

Another WhatsApp group with another PSA (public service announcement). A group of guys who are affluent enough to spare their time to reminisce their childhood. They need not see the need to chase their elusive dream anymore as that has become a reality. Everybody is courteous and wish each other well. Each reminds another to mind their time spent. They tell each other that money can be found but sadly any lost time is gone forever. No amount of money can buy time. Conversely, they rationalise that money can be made in no time.

This kind of talk permeated through a dinner party at a relative's house recently. The elder of the clan was keen to remind everyone of the need to stay focused in life. Again, spend time with loved ones, do not forgo time on Earth on chasing for wealth, etcetera. Health is wealth, money cannot buy love, time is precious blah blah.

My mind went overdrive. I was between being 'speaking my piece' and 'holding the peace'; between being a wet blanket and maintaining status quo; between making life easy as possible as most people want and playing devil's advocate. The worse part took the upper hand of me.

I related to them a middle-aged couple for whom I had to stop at a zebra-crossing. They were in shabby clothes, obviously dishevelled, dragging their probably arthritic and neglected lower limbs in a sorry state before the light turned red. I pondered upon their predicament and built my own narrative around the possibility of the present state of affair. It could be far from the truth but it is not wrong for the mind to wonder.

They could be one who thought life is a reward from our good deeds from previous lives for us to savour and indulge. Why worry about tomorrow when we do not have a clue what today may bring us? What if we are not there to enjoy tomorrow? God forbid, what if there is no tomorrow?

So, they enjoy their existence on earth without a care for the future. The trees and every living being survive the day. Mother Nature gives it all to us.

But Mother Nature had indeed had other plans for them. If their lives had been short, things have been just nice. Short and sweet. They were, however, given the curse of longevity. The long years of pains, aches, disappointments, loss of loved one, loss of earning capacity and the brunt of maintaining a body which needed regular maintenance.  The scourge of rejection by the society which no longer considered them productive and the loved one who stopped loving them when they ate into their family budget add on their burden.

For these people, it is not time that they need but money. It is nicer to travel in an air-conditioned chauffeur-driven automobile than to drag their sorry states from point A to point B.

Hair on end talk!

We were meeting after 30 years and what do we talk about? Hair. Understandably, many had lost their crowning glory or their beauty mane. In the place of David Starsky's luscious fluffy hair and John Denver's mop hair is Kojak's shining scalp. Comparing each other's tonsorial assets was the order of the day.

In the land of baldies and the receding hairlines, emerged a man with assets of Samson proportions. Standing steadfastly defiant against his wife's tirade and Delilah-like threats of trimming his lock, Samson stays adamant not to part with new found interest in trichology. Amongst the crowd also stood a gentleman with a scalp thick of Sultan Azlan-type of majestic thick silvery hair and another with a heavy white beard to compensate a somewhat bald head.

Samson justified his penchant for keeping long hair to the same reason why sages and philosophers stay unshaven. It is same justification for psychiatric ward policy of shaving patients with serious mental illnesses including schizophrenia. Besides posing a health risk if these patients decide to indulge in hair bezoar, shaving the head serves as an electromagnetic 'jumpstart' to offset their unusual brain activities, so it seems! We are all aware of the gravitational effect of the moon on events on the tide, mood and lunatics. By keeping their hairs untrimmed, brain activities stay unperturbed, they say.

That would explain why barbers think that they are one step ahead of an average man. Since hair is so important in man's thinking, being constantly immersed in the sea of hair may rub some of the clients' intelligence on them! My barber's philosophy, a topic for another day.

Aging with Grace...

Look at me,

My mane my crowning glory,

Is wiry silvery tufty.

The charm the dimple,

Has lost its wrinkle, no twinkle.

The eyes which sparkled,

Is cataractic and arched.

The neck so supple,

Used to be so nimble.

The breasts so springy and proud,

Shows its parturient sag.

The female chest so proud,

Kyphotic and osteoporotic.

The naval midriff to exhibit,

Left with striae, protuberant and scarred over. 

Posterior an asset to pride,

Is adiposed with deposition by the side. 

The thigh the thunder,

Is flabby without tone no wonder. 

The feet so petit,

Shoe size big fit.

They say it’s worth it,

To see one in your own mould.

To share, to care,

I shudder to disagree.

My mind is no more mind,

As I lost in rearing my kind. 
Tme has not been kind

As I count my time,

In the old folks home.

Just look at me!-- 

FG.

Lost in time...

During our first meeting (majlis), we, the Hutchings group, discussed about too many things. One of the things we did discuss is about djinns and angels. Perhaps, people who dwell in the business of healing probably knew more than we think they know. That they knew many things about microbiology and even psychiatry. Perhaps, their nomenclature and their explanation differ much from our understanding of etiology and pathogenesis of disease processes.

Surprise, surprise! Just the other day, there was a podcast on antibiotics and the discussion on how new antibiotics are rendered worthless within a year or so after it is marketed as the next wonder drug!

Incidentally, two microbiologists, who took greatest interest in Old English games, dressing and language stumbled upon old scriptures written by an alchemist or healer in medieval times. He had written a book on his collection of 'wonder cures'.

After translating the text and preparing meticulously a concoction using simple household items like leek, onion, honey and vinegar, they actually had a paste which successfully cured a stye!

Just like how Alexander Fleming who was feted with the Nobel prize and honoured on the Times magazine, when penicillin was discovered, these old witches and shamans must have their place in the limelight when their potions cured the illnesses of the day. Penicillin, despite its early promise and apparent breakthrough in treating infection, soon encountered drug resistance as the survival skills of the microscopic lifeforms showed their 'street smartness' through genetic engineering to stay alive. Witches' potion No. 5, must have had its spot in the monthly 'Top 40' chart before bowing sheepishly to potion No. 8 and so on.

A Rare Historical Look At Old Indonesia - 25 Photos Taken Pre-1920

http://www.wowshack.com/a-rare-historical-look-at-old-indonesia-25-photos-taken-pre-1920/

April 14, 2015

A rare and very historical look at Indonesia and its people during the Dutch colonial period.

A Javanese prince with two servants (c. 1865-1870) Tropenmuseum

A man from Batavia carrying his warung (c. 1870) Tropenmuseum

Raden Saleh, a Javanese romantic painter who pioneered modern Indonesian art (c. 1872)old-indische.blogspot.com.au

The Raja of Buleleng, Bali, and his secretary (c. 1875) Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

Two Nias warriors in the South Nias Regency (c. 1882-1912) Tropenmuseum

A man with traditional Dayak tattoos (c.1896) sickchirpse.com

Toba Batak head with his family in their home, North Sumatra (c. 1900) Tropenmuseum

Masked men of the theater acting in "Topéing", Java (c. 1900-1920) US Library Of Congress

A Dayak chief (c. 1900-1920) Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

Seudati dance performed at Samalanga, Bireun, Aceh (c. 1907) Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

A native Balinese woman spinning (c. 1910) old-indische.blogspot.com.au

A Batak family, Sumatra (c. 1910)old-indische.blogspot.com.au

Workers at a construction site for a railway tunnel in the mountains, Java (c. 1910) Tropenmuseum

Kampong residents in Batavia listen to a gramophone (c. 1910)old-indische.blogspot.com.au

A Balinese family (c. 1910-1920) Tropenmuseum

An opium dealer and a smoker (c. 1912) fareastitems.com

A Makassar man (c. 1912) Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

Nias tribesmen moving and erecting a megalith (c. 1915)Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

Dayak warriors from Longnawan, North Borneo (c. 1917) Tropenmuseum

Baris dancers drinking beer, Bali (c. 1918) fareastitems.com

Students of STOVIA, or "School for the Training of Native Physicians", Batavia (c. 1919)  Tropenmuseum

Wood carvers creating masks (c.1919) Tropenmuseum

A Batak farmer, Sumatra (c. 1919) old-indische.blogspot.com.au

An elderly Batak woman, Sumatra (c. 1919) old-indische.blogspot.com.au

A Dayak man with earrings and a lance (c. 1919) Tropenmuseum of the Royal Tropical Institute (KIT)

Forty Portraits in Forty Years

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/10/03/magazine/01-brown-sisters-forty-years.html?smid=fb-nytimes&smtyp=cur&bicmp=AD&bicmlukp=WT.mc_id&bicmst=1409232722000&bicmet=1419773522000&_r=1

Photographs by NICHOLAS NIXON

The Brown sisters have been photographed every year since 1975. The latest image in the series is published here for the first time.

.

1975, New Canaan, Conn.

Text by SUSAN MINOT

OCTOBER 3, 2014

Nicholas Nixon was visiting his wife’s family when, “on a whim,” he said, he asked her and her three sisters if he could take their picture. It was summer 1975, and a black-and-white photograph of four young women — elbows casually attenuated, in summer shirts and pants, standing pale and luminous against a velvety background of trees and lawn — was the result. A year later, at the graduation of one of the sisters, while readying a shot of them, he suggested they line up in the same order. After he saw the image, he asked them if they might do it every year. “They seemed O.K. with it,” he said; thus began a project that has spanned almost his whole career. The series, which has been shown around the world over the past four decades, will be on view at the Museum of Modern Art, coinciding with the museum’s publication of the book “The Brown Sisters: Forty Years” in November.

Who are these sisters? We’re never told (though we know their names: from left, Heather, Mimi, Bebe and Laurie; Bebe, of the penetrating gaze, is Nixon’s wife). The human impulse is to look for clues, but soon we dispense with our anthropological scrutiny — Irish? Yankee, quite likely, with their decidedly glamour-neutral attitudes — and our curiosity becomes piqued instead by their undaunted stares. All four sisters almost always look directly at the camera, as if to make contact, even if their gazes are guarded or restrained.

1975, New Canaan, Conn.

1976, Hartford 

1977, Cambridge, Mass. 

1978, Harwich Port, Mass.

1979, Marblehead, Mass.

1980, East Greenwich, R.I. 

1981, Cincinnati 

1982, Ipswich, Mass.

1983, Allston, Mass.

1984, Truro, Mass.

1985, Allston, Mass. 

1986, Cambridge, Mass.

1987, Chatham, Mass. 

1988, Wellesley, Mass.

1989, Cambridge, Mass.

1990, Woodstock, Vt.

1991, Watertown, Mass.

1992, Concord, Mass. 

1993, Boston

1994, Grantham, N.H.

1995, Marblehead, Mass.

1996, Lexington, Mass.

1997, Wellesley Hills, Mass.

1998, Falmouth, Mass.

1999, Brookline, Mass.

2000, Eastham, Mass. 

2001, Brewster, Mass.

2002, Marblehead, Mass.

2003, Ipswich, Mass.

2004, Cataumet, Mass. 

2005, Cataumet, Mass.

2006, Wellesley, Mass.

2007, Cataumet, Mass.

2008, Dallas

2009, Truro, Mass. 

2010, Truro, Mass.

2011, Truro, Mass.

2012, Boston

2013, Truro, Mass.

2014, Wellfleet, Mass.

Whenever a woman is photographed, the issue of her vanity is inevitably raised, but Nixon has finessed this with his choice of natural light, casual manner and unfussy preparation. The sisters never discuss what they are going to wear. Bebe Nixon says simply: “We just wear what we feel like wearing that day.”

Throughout this series, we watch these women age, undergoing life’s most humbling experience. While many of us can, when pressed, name things we are grateful to Time for bestowing upon us, the lines bracketing our mouths and the loosening of our skin are not among them. So while a part of the spirit sinks at the slow appearance of these women’s jowls, another part is lifted: They are not undone by it. We detect more sorrow, perhaps, in the eyes, more weight in the once-fresh brows. But the more we study the images, the more we see that aging does not define these women. Even as the images tell us, in no uncertain terms, that this is what it looks like to grow old, this is the irrefutable truth, we also learn: This is what endurance looks like.

It is the endurance of sisterhood in particular. Nixon, who grew up a single child, says he has always been particularly intrigued by the sisterly unit, and it shows in these images. With each passing year, the sisters seem to present more of a united front. Earlier assertions of their individuality — the arms folded across the chest, the standing apart — give way to a literal leaning on one another, as if independence is no longer such a concern. We see what goes on between the sisters in their bodies, particularly their limbs. A hand clasps a sister’s waist, arms embrace arms or are slung in casual solidarity over a shoulder. A palm steadies another’s neck, reassuring. The cumulative effect is dizzying and powerful. When 36 prints were exhibited in a gallery in Granada, Spain, viewers openly wept.

1981, Cincinnati

1999, Brookline, Mass.

The deepening of the sisters’ relationships extends to the one with Nixon. Each sister has always had the opportunity to weigh in on the annual selection of which shot would represent that year, but in the past 10 years, the process has become much more collaborative. Once, when the sisters were unanimous in a choice that wasn’t the same as Nixon’s, he bowed to their wish. “I have to be fair here,” he said. When his own shadow first appears, falling across the faces — in ’81, ’83 and ’84 — alongside the square of his 8-by-10 camera, you can feel him angling to join in, to be part of the group himself. But in later years, the collaborative bond between him and his subjects shows. The women’s eyes now seem to regard the photographer with a glow of trust and sisterly affection. “We’ve gotten close,” Nixon acknowledges.

As we come to the last pictures, we feel the final inevitability that, as Nixon says, “Everyone won’t be here forever.” The implication hovers in the darkening of the palette and in the figures drawing together, huddling as if to stay afloat. To watch a person change over time can trick us into thinking we share an intimacy, and yet somehow we don’t believe that these poses and expressions are the final reflection of the Brown sisters. The sisters allow us to observe them, but we are not allowed in. The reluctance shows particularly in the early pictures: the wary lowered brow, the pressed line of a mouth. Sometimes a body’s stance or the angle of the jaw is downright grudging. These subjects are not after attention, a rare quality in this age when everyone is not only a photographer but often his own favorite subject. In this, Nixon has pulled off a paradox: The creation of photographs in which privacy is also the subject. The sisters’ privacy has remained of utmost concern to the artist, and it shows in the work. Year after year, up to the last stunning shot with its triumphant shadowy mood, their faces and stances say, Yes, we will give you our image, but nothing else.

2014, Wellfleet, Mass. The latest portrait in this series, published here for the first time.

Nicholas Nixon is a photographer whose work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Museum of Modern Art, among many others.
Susan Minot is a novelist and short-story writer.

All photographs by Nicholas Nixon/Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco and Pace/MacGill Gallery, New York.
Digital design: Rodrigo De Benito Sanz. Photo editor: Joanna Milter.