Hank and Passion

Hank is a fellow I have a rather complex relationship with. Some days we are super tight. Other days I feel like we are enemies. It usually depends on what stupid shit came out of my mouth recently and what he remembers and chooses to not remember.

He has this unique brand of dry humor where he says things over and over as if he is dead serious but underneath it all, I know he is yanking my chain.

He has a remarkable knowledge of music - spanning many forms and this knowledge never ceases to amaze me in his ability to put a show together on the fly. Unfortunately he lacks mastery of any particular instrument, although I have to admit he is a pretty good percussionist. He is one of those dudes who appreciates really complex music but never had the opportunity to pursue an instrument seriously when his mind was most able to grasp it (i.e. during childhood). Either that or he had other priorities in life.

Music (particularly growing an audience for jazz) is so much a part of my life, that sometimes I forget to realize that there are so many things that make others happy about living. For Hank, it's a mixture of many different things as far as I can tell. He not only has a deep appreciation for music, but also technology, fine arts, film, and god knows what else. For Plumpernickel its poetry and writing. For DJ Denton its RF and other technical shit.

This brings me to a broader and more profound point - people at CMU might be very "boring" in my view. They might be very "one-dimensional" but they must be really passionate about what they do. I mean a lot of them must LOVE engineering and computers so much that all their energies are focused on those areas. That concept just throws me for a loop. That kind of dedication requires spending hundreds of hours in libraries and labs trying to figure out stuff that countless others before have agonized over. However, much like the arts, all this stuff requires a good amount of creativity and ingenuity to achieve new ends and I respect that.

Now listening to: Woody Herman - Featuring Stan Getz ("Blues in the Night")