Apples of Gold

Hey Nameless,

Picture this … a lobby in Intel, Austin. You’re here for an interview and your future is hanging by a thin thread. Then you see this sight and it just takes your breath away. It was so startlingly beautiful, that all you can do is to stare and stare and stare… the interview is the last thing on your mind.

A grey metal wall, recessed into the wood-panelling. There are these miniature bulbs on top, providing cones of diffused yellow light. Attached onto the wall are rows and rows of grey-metal blocks, probably about 10 cm x 10 cm. They are slightly raised, the same effect that you would have if you had rows of photo-frames. You can see some writing in black on them. You look closer and you see that each block has a name and below it, a technical title. You realize that these are inventors and the patents that they have filed. Obviously you can’t make head or tail of what you read, but you know you’re looking at the achievements of some of the best and smartest humans on the planet. The magnitude of their accomplishments just fills you with awe. And, not just one, but rows and rows of them. This is truly inspiring, but what really blows your mind is a the center-piece of this show. A huge black monolith, at the center. The writing is in white and the light gives it almost a heavenly glow. It had these words by Henry David Thoreau –

“If one advances confidently in the direction of one's dreams, and endeavors to live the life which one has imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected in common hours”

I guess, it was the spirit of that moment more than the display or the words. I wanted something to inspire me and this was just there, at the right time and right place. I’m a sucker for quotes. I know that most of the time they are pointless, trite statements taken out of context and applied to situations that the author might never have intended. But, like that saying from Proverbs 25:11 goes, “A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver” (yes!!! I notice the irony – explaining the usefulness of quotes with the help of another one!).

I can go on forever about my search for a quote that is truly good and lasts forever, but we’ll do that another day. I think Thoreau deserves to be in a post all by himself.

cheers,
day-dreamer