Good morning. How poetic is it that the last Sunday of 2023 is also the last day of 2023?

The last few weeks of the year have been magical in Bengaluru. The belated winter is finally here.

It isn’t the bone-chilling winters of North India (I know, I grew up in Delhi) where you need to bring out your woollens and jackets. On the contrary, we still switch our fans on at night.

Instead, it’s been a fortnight of crystal-clear blue skies, cold and crisp air, and bright sun that hits your face at the slanting angles that makes every hour look like a version of the golden hour.

So much so that some of us at The Ken have fallen into this wasteful habit of walking down to the nearby Blue Tokai after lunch for a mid-day fix of caffeine. Our walks are languid and our conversations unhurried.

Enough about me. I hope you’ve had an eventful year.

Over my professional life I’ve now learnt that it isn’t happiness or prosperity that I wish for, whether for myself or my friends and colleagues. That is a by-product, if at all.

Instead, it’s eventfulness and interestingness. Like the often-repeated Chinese curse/blessing (but possibly apocryphal): “May you live in interesting times.”

I have not reached that age yet where I long for sameness and predictability. But I am also past that age where I despised sameness and predictability. Alas, such is middle age.

But I’ve been fortunate that in 2023, I hit walls, discovered paths, and travelled journeys as a founder, writer, parent, husband, friend, and individual.

I even managed to fulfil a long-held desire to create a sealed terrarium. Here it is, on my home desk. 

I love the idea of trying to recreate a miniature version of a closed-loop ecosystem, complete with moisture cycles, inside of a glass jar. (A few folks have already told me I made a rookie mistake of adding too much soil, especially for a sealed terrarium. I hope to correct that with my second project.)

But one of the most deeply rewarding of my 2023 projects has been the First Principles Sunday newsletter.