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torentialtribute · 5 years

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STUART BROAD: Like Jonny Bairstow, I used to think the media was out to get me

I have been in Bairstow's position and it is not advisable to end up in a public saliva

The comments do not represent the team,

I am confident that what he said is not the collective opinion, but what he has in his mind

By Stuart Broad for the Mail on Sunday

Published: 22:48 BST, June 29, 2019 | participating in regular bilateral series.

It is not just your physical ability to deliver skills such as hitting the top off-stump or hitting the ball through the covers that has been tested.

There has been a mental challenge presented by such global events across all major sports, and that's why I think team psychologist David Young has been the most important person in the dressing room in England since Tuesday night. ]

<img id = "i-cfff88d5439a6067" src = "https://ift.tt/2Jit16P a-22_1561841468352.jpg "height =" 430 "width =" 634 "alt =" Jonny Bairstow is waiting for us to fail Jonny Bairstow is a lot of noise staged by Jonny Bairstow & # 39; s & # 39; waiting for us to fail & # 39; comments

A lot of noise staged by Jonny Bairstow is waiting for us to fail

This is it kind of time that the man I call affectionately & # 39; head & # 39; earns his money, reminds players of their strengths and strengthens the playing style that brought this team to the top of the tournament rankings.

He will tell people to stick to their weapons: for Jonny Bairstow, which makes him a player, for Jos Buttler to continue to take his photos, and for Eoin Morgan to continue to focus on six though he gets stuck at the border.

Many of the conversations that will take place prior to Sunday's game against India will be led by the player, because when you reach the border Of course there aren't many of them, but I don't know what to do.

Of course there has been a lot of external noise, staged by Jonny Bairstow & # 39; s & # 39; waiting for us to fail & # 39; comments, and I confess that I feel somewhat responsible – because I had to appear on Wednesday for Yorkshire Tea, only for Nottinghamshire to call a training session, which meant that I had to pull out

I had not been involved in this tournament, everything had attracted me less attention, but of course one of the protagonists of Jonny was headline on news a and created unwanted distractions around the team.

Don't get me wrong, I've been in this position before and this is very much like I say, not the I response to the incident – because myself and Michael Vaughan were a thing-dong in the summer of 2018 had – but it is not advisable to be included in a public exchange in this way

The comments do not represent this team from England. The public wants them to succeed. At my Friday launch testimonial, every person was desperately looking for them to defeat India.

I am confident that what he said is not the collective opinion, but what he has in mind. He is someone who is very capable of getting to the mental place where he feels that the world is against him. He then rises to the top. Hopefully his words will trigger the best in him.

<img id = "i-16ba890e3558809c" src = "https://ift.tt/2XhjJSk image-a-23_1561841472746.jpg "height =" 442 "width =" 634 "alt =" I am convinced that what he said is not the collective image, but what it is in Bairstow's head "

<img id = "i-16ba890e3558809c" src = "https://ift.tt/2JdywDP" height = " 442 "width =" 634 "alt =" I am

I am confident that what he said is not the collective opinion, but what he said is not what the collective opinion is. what's in Bairstow & # 39; s own head

My view of how to respond to criticism has undoubtedly changed, helped by experiences such as Tuesday when I was part of the Sky Sports commentary team for defeat against Australia, and spent a long time in the press box.

Me wish the 21-year-old I had the opportunity to experience such environments because it would have given me a different perspective. I spent five years being ultra-defensive towards the media, thinking that they were always out to reach me, and I think Jonny might be in that place.

Last year, after Vaughan said that I should have fallen for the Headingley test against Pakistan, I called on the phone for an hour and a half while driving north. I'm not sure about that. He has a very good cricket brain that should not be lost to the game, and it is his job to give opinions.

This week's exchange has just increased the noise around the game, but this is an experienced team led by an experienced Morgan captain and they will know how to solve all of this.

The sound during the game must now be the focus. I played in the Champions Trophy final against India in 2013 and it felt like an away game. We were booed when we entered the field. Will it happen today? Absolutely. Is that going to get the best out of the right characters? Absolutely. Will there be bumbling and hidden characters? Potential. Fortunately, England does not have many and that is why we are a good team.

<img id = "i-a05c8c0e64e93915" src = "https://ift.tt/2XhjAOB image-a-24_1561841481957.jpg "height =" 417 "width =" 634 "alt =" England hopes for blue skies, a belter of a surface and also a bit more of Adil Rashid will hope for blue skies, a belter of a surface and also a little more from Adil Rashid "

England will hope for blue skies, a belt of a surface and also a little more from Adil Rashid

This is a special day to be an English cricket player – it's knockout cricket now and England still has the brilliant chance to make the semi-final.

They will hope for a blue sky and a belter of a surface. They also need something more from Adil Rashid.

Edgbaston, however, is his favorite ground and it would be an ideal time for him to produce the kind of magic delivery he rejected Virat Kohli at Headingley last year.

Kohli has been his constant self so far, but – although India is undefeated – they do not break this World Cup and, after not performing particularly well against the West Indies or Afghanistan, the bowlers of England like it

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ecompaniesusa · 5 years

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Most entrepreneurs fail. Entrepreneurial heroes know how to “pivot”

Entrepreneurs are seen as vitally important for job creation in South Africa, yet it’s tough for entrepreneurs to survive and thrive. A survey late last year involving more than 1,000 entrepreneurs indicated that nearly half of those who start their own business spotted fresh business opportunities or growth prospects. But, inability to access funds is often a major challenge in turning business dreams into realities; so too are other factors, like government red tape. Surveys can be fairly superficial, quantifying what’s known or assumed to be the response rather than excavating new gems of knowledge. In this podcast, US business expert Jacqueline Kirtley points to another challenge that is not considered in South African surveys: the ability of an entrepreneur to dramatically adapt strategy to avoid failure and get onto a positive path towards success. Many call this “pivoting”. Kirtley explains exactly what it means to pivot, after undertaking in-depth research with entrepreneurs over several years, in a piece produced by the University of Pennsylvania’s Knowledge@Wharton. – Jackie Cameron

When and how entrepreneurs pivot

“Pivot” is a popular term in the start-up world. If their initial idea doesn’t work as planned, entrepreneurs are expected to be ready to pursue a Plan B. But what does it actually mean to pivot – and are entrepreneurs really as open to doing it as they say they are? In a new paper, Wharton management professor Jacqueline “Jax” Kirtley used a field study involving seven early stage firms in the energy and cleantech sector to take a closer look at how these strategic changes actually play out in the startup world. “What is a Pivot? Explaining When and How Entrepreneurial Firms Decide to Make Strategic Change and Pivot,” was co-authored with Siobhan O’Mahony, a professor at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. Kirtley recently talked with Knowledge@Wharton about their findings.

An edited transcript of the conversation follows.

Knowledge@Wharton: The term “pivot” is pretty widely used, but can you talk a little bit about what its origins are?

Jacqueline “Jax” Kirtley: The use of the word as a specifically entrepreneurial term comes from Eric Ries and Steve Blank’s books on what’s now referred to as the “Lean Startup Movement.” They talk a lot about how you can use basically the scientific method – making hypotheses about what’s going on in your entrepreneurial firm – because there’s so much uncertainty for entrepreneurs. They suggest that you can think about explicit hypotheses about what you’re doing, and then test them.

And when you test those hypotheses, they either get validated or they don’t. And if you look at what the Lean Startup Movement is saying, when your hypotheses are not valid – are not shown to be accurate – you should change. You should pivot your strategy and create new hypotheses and test those. And that’s where the word “pivot” came into entrepreneurship – this very specific methodology. But it has been picked up by everybody and their brother, and it’s not used that precisely anymore. Now it is used by anybody who wants to talk about how we’ve changed – we’ve pivoted, we’ve pivoted our strategy.

Read also: Ramaphosa: SA’s entrepreneurs need to be treated like heroes

I actually had a student entrepreneur once tell me that they pivot every day. And that doesn’t make any sense. You don’t really change your strategy every day. In the paper, I specifically refer to the example of Slack and Flickr. [Co-founder] Stewart Butterfield started out making big online video games. And they didn’t work, so he changed from running a massive multi-player online video game to Flickr, which is an image sharing website based on technology that was part of the original game. That, we think of as a pivot because it’s a massive change. The word “pivot” is very evocative. You think of basketball players who have planted one foot and changed direction but kept that one foot down. We usually think about that as the technology or the firm — there’s something you keep, but you change your direction very completely.

So we all talk about pivots as if they are big changes. But we also hear entrepreneurs talk about pivots as little changes. And we’ve started to see the word come up to refer to anything – politicians pivot, and there was a period a couple of years ago where there were all these self-help articles about how to pivot your life. It has just become this ubiquitous, not specific term, but to entrepreneurs, it still has this very specific – or at least semi-specific – usage. We still talk about entrepreneurs in this way, and we teach it, too. We teach this scientific method of hypothesis-driven entrepreneurship.

So for me, I wanted to get down to, “Well, what is it really, then?” A lot of entrepreneurs will tell you, “We’re willing to pivot. We’re open to it.” But what does that really look like, and what does that really mean? That was something I wanted to understand.

“A lot of entrepreneurs will tell you, ‘We’re willing to pivot. We’re open to it.’ But what does that really look like, and what does that really mean?”

Knowledge@Wharton: How were you able to study this question?

Kirtley: So this paper is coming out of my dissertation study. The dissertation [data] is three years, but the data collection has continued on since then. It’s now at, I think, about seven. I went out to the firms multiple times a year, talked to multiple people within the firm, and did interviews over several years, asking: What are they doing? What are the big decisions they’re working on? How is the firm evolving?

All the firms in this study are doing some kind of novel knowledge – in many cases, right out of a lab, trying to take it to market in energy and clean tech. So these are very hard-science, very technologically advanced concepts that they’re trying to bring out – products and technologies. How does your strategy evolve? How does your technology evolve when you start a firm like that? I showed up on their doorstep every few months and observed what they were doing, talked to different people within the firm about the big decisions going on, about what they were working on, to understand how things were changing.

What this gave me was the opportunity to see the before, during and after of big decisions. That’s the basis of this data. If I can see what are the things that lead up to a decision – a big decision about your strategy, about changing your strategy or pivoting – I can get a sense of what actually triggered a decision, and then what are the things you’re thinking about during that decision? Some of the pieces within one decision may be related to other decisions, or they may be related to things you were thinking about a year ago that become relevant to that decision-making. And then once you’ve made the decision, what happens next? This paper doesn’t get too much at what happens next. It’s mostly focused on the decision-making and the choice to change or not change.

Knowledge@Wharton: As you delved deeper into that decision-making, what did you learn about the nature of pivots, and also the nature of things that were not pivots?

Kirtley: I have seven firms in the data, and they are all firms that were very, very early-stage when I met them. None of them had a product on the market when they first started talking to me, and several of them still don’t.

And what I was fascinated by is they all say they’re open to change. They’re young firms. They know there are things they don’t know about what’s happening, about what’s going to be the case, what’s going to work. So they’re all open to change.

Knowledge@Wharton: I think an entrepreneur, anyone doing a startup, has to say that, be open to that, to some extent.

Kirtley: Anyone who is an entrepreneur is acting under uncertainty. So that’s actually something you would say. Any entrepreneur is acting under uncertainty, in that they’re doing something other people don’t think is worth it, is right, or is going to work. And they’re open to the fact that they might be wrong about some parts, but they’re usually pretty clear on the [core strategy] being totally there, and that this is going to work. And this is the strength they have behind their own convictions. In this paper, I look at 93 different decisions where at least one of the options involved changing the strategy.

Knowledge@Wharton: When you say “changing the strategy,” is it changing that core belief or technology?

Kirtley: Changing something fundamental about what the firm is doing. So a change in the strategy might be: Are we a service company? Are we a product company? It might be: Are we funding ourselves through grants, or are we funding ourselves through VCs? Are we going to get contracted-out engineers, or are we only going to do work internally? There’s a whole bunch of different kinds of things that are part of your strategy, and for these 93 decisions, where at least one of the options they considered was a change, most of the time they didn’t change. Most of the time – and that’s 72 decisions – they didn’t change. As an outsider, very often I was surprised by this. I thought change was the right thing to do.

One example would be a firm deciding whether or not to build a physical prototype of their product – because their full-sized product is about the size of this room, and costs a couple of million dollars to build. So you don’t just build one of those just to show off. You can’t afford it. But they also thought it wasn’t worth designing a small prototype, because they knew anything you could do in a small prototype already existed in the world, and their new technology was only relevant at full-scale.

They thought it would be a waste of time and money to build what they called a “toy.” And potential investors kept saying to them, “But you don’t have anything that works. You don’t have something I can see working.” So they asked themselves the question: Should we build a toy just for investor marketing? And that would have been a change in their strategy. They had come up with: How much money do we need to do all this? What are we spending our time on? What activities are we doing? You have to actually design a small version, not just say, “OK, I’ve got the big one, and I’m going to build a small one.” You have to actually make design choices and find the right parts to be able to build something that fits on a table, when the real thing is the size of a room.

They entered that decision process, and to me, as an outsider, I was figuring they were going to build this because they were having a lot of trouble finding money, finding investors, finding even grants. And they decided not to. And it took them a couple more years to get the money they needed to really get their firm started after that decision. Were they right? Were they wrong? I have no idea. But they decided to stay on their path of not building a prototype. What I saw in this study, more often than not, is that the entrepreneurs didn’t change their beliefs about what was the right thing to do, what was the right path to take. When you don’t change any of the beliefs you hold about the uncertainties you face and the challenges you are dealing with, you’re not going to change your strategy.

That was actually one of the first things that I would say this study found: As an entrepreneur, you have beliefs about the things you don’t know for sure — the uncertainties. If your beliefs don’t change, you don’t change your strategy. You stay on course. But every once in a while, in this case, only in about 21 instances, they did change. They did change their beliefs about what to do, about what was going on, about what was uncertain. Their beliefs did get affected.

“For these 93 decisions, where at least one of the options they considered was a change, most of the time they didn’t change.”

Knowledge@Wharton: So in that minority of cases, what was going on there? Because it sounds like there was a pretty huge bar to clear to get them to make that change.

Kirtley: Unfortunately at this stage, I don’t know exactly which situations cause your beliefs to change and which ones don’t. That’s future research to do. But what I can see in this data is, in some cases, what the entrepreneurs believed about what they didn’t know or what they were unsure about – the uncertainties they faced – and if they were contradicted – that could be, “My belief was wrong. I was wrong about this market.” Or “I was wrong about the idea that partners would be willing to pay us or to work with us.” So there’s some belief that’s contradicted by new information. And it might be that the belief is wrong, and it might be just that the belief doesn’t align with the strategy we have, that I really do believe that this product is best sold as a component to some else’s system, but the someone else’s out there don’t want to buy it. So I still believe that this product is best entered into the market as a component, but since that’s not going to happen, that’s not going to work. None of those system-makers want to buy it. I’m going to have to do something else. There’s this contradiction.

In those cases, the entrepreneurs exited something. They said, “OK, this is not the right product.” And they stopped the product. When the entrepreneurs entered these decisions, they were triggered by the problems and the opportunities – new information that’s either unfavourable or favourable. The problems, when they affected their beliefs, led to these exits. There’s a contradiction in what I believe, and I need to exit something.

Opportunities – what I saw was the beliefs expanded. So I believe that my microchip technology is going to change the world. Well, then I learned a new piece of information about how to build my product without a microchip, using off-the-shelf electronic components. And what I, as a researcher, found is over time, as this team was deciding, “Well, do I need to make a microchip product? Could I make something that isn’t a microchip? – their language changed about those beliefs. Instead of talking about how our microchip technology is going to change the world, as this decision process went on, I heard them say, “Our core technology is going to change the world.” Their beliefs expanded. What they believed about their uncertainty, what they believed about what they were doing, grew. And in those cases, they added to their strategy. And in this example, they added a second product. And this is a two or three-year-old firm that hasn’t finished the first product, doesn’t have all the money they need to get to market on the first product, but they’ve added a second product, and they think this is worth doing.

And they believe in it. They believe that having two products is going to be valuable. One will get to market sooner, one will give us this, and one will give us that. So they added to their strategy.

What kind of choices are they making? They’re making an addition choice, or they’re making a subtraction and exit choice. But if you talk about a pivot, if you think about Stewart Butterfield going from a video game to Flickr, that’s bigger than one exit or one addition. You look at what you have and what your products are and what you could sell. And you identify, “Well, we have this image-sharing system that we’ve been using internally, and we could turn that into a product.”

This is something that I think kind of gets at the core of the findings about pivots. When you make a choice to change your strategy… it’s an incremental choice, but it’s a specific choice to add, to exit. You make this specific choice.

A pivot is, “I’ve changed and redirected my strategy. I was a game company, and now I am a photo-sharing website.” That kind of change is actually an accumulation of adds and exits. And over time, you accumulate those. And that time might be a day. That time may be six months.

“A pivot is, ‘I’ve changed and redirected my strategy. I was a game company, and now I am a photo-sharing website.’ That kind of change is actually an accumulation of adds and exits.”

One of the firms in my study actually went six months with no product defined. They exited their product, and it took them six months and a couple of different potential addition decisions – potential products they could add – before they decided, “This is the product we’re going to sell, and now this is what we’re going to do.” It took six months of a firm living on grants, with no product defined, and being willing to live in that uncertainty.

When we think about the pivot, we think about these big stories, and we tell them from two miles high. We were a game company. We are now Flickr. What happens on the ground, the decisions – that’s really what the unit of analysis is in this study. The decisions are more steps, and they compile, they aggregate into this complete redirection of what we’re doing as a strategy and what we’re doing now.

Knowledge@Wharton: For those 20-something decisions to make a big change, it wasn’t that they all at once decided, “We’re just going to make this big pivot.” It was really a lot of different things going on over time that added up to a pivot.

Kirtley: It’s not a basketball player who plants one foot and turns around completely and changes direction. It is a set of decisions that, when you look over time – I was a product company that was focused on a number of different industries that could all use this energy device. And now, two years later, I will tell you that I am a service company with a set of products targeting one industry in energy. That’s a pivot. That’s a significant redirection of the firm. But in the case of that firm, there are 18 decisions, and some of them were to change. Some of them were not to change. Some of them you exited – you exited a product – and then that example went six months without knowing what your product is. Some of them, we added a product, or we added a customer, we added a joint venture, a partnership – things that really did change what our activities were, where we used our resources, what our day-to-day strategy was, what our firm did. But really redirecting from “I’m a product firm for lots of markets” to “I’m a service firm with products to one sector of energy” – that takes a lot of decisions.

One of the things I also found really fascinating throughout the data was when I talked casually with these entrepreneurs and their teams, they would say, “Yeah, we’re open to pivots.” But when we talked about the decisions they were actually making, when we talked about what they’re doing today and what they’re thinking about, they never used the word. There were, probably in all the data I have, a couple hundred hours of interviews. The word “pivot” was maybe used twice, and it was retrospective, to refer to kind of the era before – and the era now.

Knowledge@Wharton: So they didn’t really necessarily even recognise the pivot while it was going on?

Kirtley: For a company that had made this kind of change – we were a product firm; now we’re a service firm – they might say, “Well, before we pivoted, we were looking at retail. We had a marketing person start looking into retail. And now that person’s role has changed.”

“We need to be careful when you’re talking to an entrepreneur who’s trying to do their thing today, that they don’t assume that that person had it easy and made all these decisions in one minute and was so certain.”

That role didn’t change in a day. It was over time. But that would be the only time in the data I ever heard these people use the word “pivot.” This retrospective [reference] to something that happened, and they’re referring to something that happened over the last year or two. But when you talk to them about entrepreneurship in general, they’ll say, “Oh, we’re open to pivots. We realise that this might not be exact, that things will change.” But when they’re making these decisions, that’s not the word they’re using. That’s not what they’re thinking about. They’re thinking about – What do I believe is the right thing now? What is going to work? And how is this firm going to succeed?

Knowledge@Wharton: Your research focuses on hard-science and clean tech firms. Do you feel like the thought process and actual change of strategy is different for them than it would be for say, a tech start-up where the manufacturing costs and overhead might not be as high?

Kirtley: I think it applies either way, although the challenge of it, the beliefs you’re holding onto, how hard it is to change – those are going to be different. Maybe this is one of those instances where for a firm that is building a new kind of alternative energy generation, choosing to exit a product might be a slower decision because of what we’re doing, whereas deciding one day that this online video game isn’t working – that might be a decision I could make faster.

But I think we see, if we look at some of these assumed-to-be easier and faster startups like Flickr – even something like Google, where Google started out, their original business model was, “We’re going to license Search Powered by Google. We’re going to sell you a hardware device that you put internally to your servers at your office, and we’re going to have advertising.” But the advertising was actually something they weren’t that excited about. When they added AdWords in 2000, that was an addition to the company that was part of a set of decisions that turned them into what they are now, which is the mega-advertising system they are. They only stopped selling those hardware devices that you put internally to the servers in your office two years ago. So they’ve made choices that are steps of adds and exits, and we talk about the big pivot there, as well.

What my data allowed me to do is look at these extreme cases where maybe it was easier for me to see the choices being made – some of the kinds of changes they were dealing with or considering. But I think it is valid – the findings are generalisable to entrepreneurship in general.

Knowledge@Wharton: What do you think is the value for entrepreneurs, or even for budding entrepreneurs to understand this process a little better?

Kirtley: I think it’s the idea that you can pivot and survive. This is one of the things about pivot I think a lot of entrepreneurs like. If I know that this isn’t working, I can pivot, and I can still succeed. That’s something that is a good thing for entrepreneurs to know. Because most entrepreneurial firms fail. So knowing that there’s an alternate – a way to survive, a way to change and move forward – that’s a good thing to know.

Assuming that you’re going to just make that one choice one day, and you’re going to go from being a game to being an image platform – that might be a lot to expect of yourself.

We talk a lot about entrepreneurial heroes when we talk about Facebook and Google and Flickr. We talk about these successful hero entrepreneurs. We need to be careful when you’re talking to an entrepreneur who’s trying to do their thing today, that they don’t assume that that person had it easy and made all these decisions in one minute and was so certain.

I think for an entrepreneur who’s facing these challenges – Should I pivot? Did I pivot wrong? Were these decisions right? Did I just change the wrong way? Knowing that all of these stories are more steps and that the big pivot isn’t a decision you’re making today – that, I think, can be helpful to the entrepreneurs as they’re doing these things.

Knowledge@Wharton: So for future lines for this research, where are some other places you’d like to go with it?

“The optimist in me is attracted to this idea, that these opportunities we stumble over after we’ve already started the firm are significant to what our firms evolve into.”

Kirtley: Well, as I mentioned, I can’t say right now why some decisions resulted in beliefs being affected or changed. What’s the difference between the ones where the beliefs remained – where they stayed, and nothing changed or nothing was affected?

I would love to be able to find out more about the difference between those, and I think that could be incredibly helpful – especially if eventually there’s some way to connect that to how good or bad those decisions become. That’s a little idealistic. I’m not sure whether I will get there.

Another thing that I found really interesting in the data – opportunities led to decisions to change more often than problems. We think of it as if my current strategy fails, I’ll pivot. That’s a very firefighting perspective. It’s very negative. But one of the things that this data pointed to is some of these changes are coming more from, “Oh, there’s something cool I can also do.”

One of the examples of that in the data happens while driving in the customer’s truck. The customer starts talking about how “our industry came to a stand-still last winter for two weeks because of weather.” And the conversation continues, and the entrepreneurs realise, “Wait a minute, there’s a feature to what we’re already building that could solve the problem this gentleman just mentioned.” This is an opportunity that we have to solve something that’s real, that’s fundamental, that we didn’t know about before. And it’s not anywhere near the idea that these entrepreneurs had when they founded their company, but there’s something led by these opportunities, led by something more positive and less firefighting. The optimist in me is attracted to this idea, that these opportunities we stumble over after we’ve already started the firm are significant to what our firms evolve into.

We tell a lot of hero stories when it comes to probably business in general, but definitely entrepreneurship. We love to tell the story of the phoenix rising from the ashes, or the college dropout who became a billionaire. There’s a lot of energy that comes from those stories. There’s a lot of excitement and motivation that can come from those stories, but there are a lot of important details we don’t pay attention to when we just focus on the hero story.

The opportunities that you stumble upon along the way that are significant to what your firm becomes – those really change the story and change it for the better. And I think that’s something that’s worth understanding more.

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saleggdbsneakers-blog · 5 years

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musicmapglobal · 6 years

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India's Jwala collective are spreading the fire (Insight: New Delhi / Mumbai)

Currently consisting of eight members, Jwala’s combination of work ethic, youthful talent and mastery of a range of styles is making the collective an essential addition to India’s DIY music scene. With most members currently still in their teenage years, much of the press around them has focused on the surprise that their generation are able to form a motivated and multifaceted artistic movement. As they discuss below, they’d rather be critiqued on their output than their youth.

Jwala are impressive enough without commenting on their ages anyway. In typical internet culture fashion, it’s the attitude rather than the aesthetic that is considered paramount. Genre wise, their scene encompasses producers wanting to recreate the big room EDM of major names like Deadmau5 and Skrillex, while others tap into traditional Indian timbres, which both sit alongside various forms of pop, lo-fi and experimentation. What they all share is eagerness to be involved, both with each other and the world around them.

We reached out to the collective to get all the insider info on their history, hometowns, activity, and plans for the future.

Describe where you live in ten words or less.

Brij Dalvi (Three Oscillators / zzz)): In the suburbs, in town, we’re scattered everywhere.

Ayush Jajoria (Ayush.): I live in New Delhi, India and it’s nothing compared to what you expect it to be, still decent. Could be worse.

Palash Kothari (Sparkle & Fade): All of us live in different areas of two major cities of India, Delhi and Mumbai. Although I think it’s the internet where we all grew up so geography never really mattered too much.

Who are you, and what first got you interested in music production?

Brij Dalvi: Well I used to listen to a lot of Skrillex and Savant and a host of other artists back when I was in junior college. It was the sounds that they made that made me want to explore music production further because I wanted to emulate these guys.

Ayush Jajoria: I am an independent indie musician/music producer with the interest varying in lots of different genres but for the most part indie Music is my thing. What first got me interested in music production or rather electronic music in general was Deadmau5 and Armin van Buuren I think. Back in the day I was really fascinated by the sound they created as it was something totally new to me so I was so so soo amazed by it that I wanted to see how it’d been created. One time during my summer holidays I gave it a go and here I am.

Palash Kothari: I’m currently studying journalism and have been making music as Sparkle & Fade for almost two years now but I’ve messed around with other aliases before. Music production for me started off when I was in junior high school as a means to be able to write and record without really going through the trouble of putting a band together. I got into electronic music a couple of months after. I didn’t even realise how it transitioned from being a hobby to something that I’d do most of my teenage life.

Jwala consists of around seven artists, could you give us an overview of the players involved?

Brij Dalvi: We’re actually eight members now; we just included a new member from Delhi some time ago. To give you an overview:

Palash Kothari goes by the stage name Sparkle & Fade and he’s the one who planted the seed to forming a collective, and we all joined. Palash makes chilled out, introspective tunes, sometimes loaded with Indian instruments. Karan Kanchan uses his own name on stage and is influenced by Japan and its vibrant culture, and it’s reflected in a ton of his tracks that loosely fall under the “Trap” category, but have distinct identities of their own, thanks to Karan’s sound designing skills.

Apurv Agarwal goes by the name Cowboy and Sailor Man, and during the times that he doesn’t make songs for his solo project he produces for several Indian bands and is a member of several more, as a guitarist or a synthesist. Ayush Jajoria goes by the stage name Ayush. His tunes fall under the Garage and ambient categories, and he has some aliases in development that aim to cover genres pertaining to dance and harder styles of electronic music.

Nikunj Patel aka Moebius does a lot of visual work apart from his music. He makes a lot of trip-hop and offbeat electronica, usually influenced by a ton of movies, and is a major contributor to most of our artworks. Veer Kowli (aka Chrms) mostly makes future bass and trap, while occasionally indulging in ambient soundscapes. Veer also dabbles in graphics and film making from time to time, all self-taught.

Dolorblind is Rohan Sinha, an industrial design student who makes a lot of dark, eerie ambient music. He’s the newest member of Jwala and only one out of the two people from Delhi (the other being Ayush.) The rest of us are from Mumbai.

I have two main projects: Three Oscillators (with my friend Avit Rane) and zzz. Under Three Oscillators we make a lot of post-dubstep and glitch-hop, while as zzz I make a ton of lo-fi.

Your collective output consists of a lot of future beats and chilled hip-hop vibes, who are the artists that inspire you?

Palash Kothari: I’m sure we have a long list of influences but for the most part we’re very inspired by each other. It was what made us leave the ‘online’ space and work together to build something which stretches to real offline interaction.

In terms of sound, I’d say Four Tet has been the biggest inspiration. I also had the privilege of meeting him when he played at Magnetic Fields Festival in Rajasthan last December. Yeah, Four Tet, Porter Robinson, Madeon, Anoushka Shankar, Shivkumar Sharma, MIDIval Punditz, Bon Iver, AR Rahman, Talvin Singh etc.

Ayush Jajoria: Mainly we all inspire each other to do better work but my personal picks are Owesey, Enzalla, joji, Direct etc.

What’s the ‘motto’ of the Jwala collective (if there is one)?

Brij Dalvi: Spread the fire (Jwala means fire in Hindi).

Talk to us about your local scenes, what venues and parties are you playing?

Brij Dalvi: As a collective, we’ve played thrice ’till now. It has been a privilege to play at some of the best venues in Mumbai, like Raasta and antiSOCIAL. As individuals, we play often at some usual places not limited to the aforementioned spots.

Palash Kothari: A lot of gigs which happen here are DIY or semi-DIY, where neither the artist or the promoter makes money. There’s a lot of stuff happening in different pockets of the country and a lot of people are doing what they do just for the love of music without expecting anything in return. I see a lot of people curb creativity for a fatter booking fee but where there’s no money (like a lot of the space here) everybody does what they feel like without giving much of a fuck.

Personally I’ve played everything from the “typical” party where people come in, drink their hearts out and music is just there in the background to extremely ‘experimental’ ones where I have complete creative freedom and am not expected to sell any booze.

What are the most important artists from your scene, both from Jwala and elsewhere, who we should be listening to?

Palash Kothari: These are some of the biggest names in the scene, in no particular order…

A lot of the articles around you mention your ages, usually the writers are surprised you’re that young. Does this focus on your age annoy you or is this something you think about as well?

Brij Dalvi: It’s definitely a little annoying. We’d rather be judged on the content we put out rather than the fact that we’re below 25 or something. The surprise element doesn’t exist anymore, because there are several young kids doing some amazing stuff out there, and it’s not only limited to music. Age shouldn’t be a bragging right in music. However old you are, if you’re a hard worker and you make good music, you deserve the spotlight in equal measure.

Ayush Jajoria: It’s good to know the context before reading but at times it does get a bit annoying, seeing our age be the focus point of all this. While I don’t mind it much, I still would like them to focus more on our music and what we are doing rather than on the personal aspect of it.

Palash Kothari: I think most of it is because ’15 year old xyz’ would get more clicks than ‘producer xyz’ in an article. Some of it is also genuine surprise because there’s some sort of new wave of young producers flooding in the [independent] ‘scene’ previously dominated by an older age group.

What is the DIY/internet community like in India, are there other collectives or artists who inspired you to start Jwala? I see the REProduce name pop up in relation to you quite a lot…

Brij Dalvi: It’s still nascent but it’s growing. Our city has a collective named Dasta and a label named Nrtya. They’re both doing some amazing work when it comes to propagating music production and the so-called DIY culture, and we’re doing something along the same lines.

As far as REProduce goes, it is headed by Rana Ghose, and he organises Listening Rooms around India. The concept is: people come for the gig and absorb the music on their own terms. These Listening Rooms are the reason we could express our music freely, and it was one such Listening Room during the end of April that we were all on the same lineup. Most of us met each other for the first time there. We got together on Facebook a couple of months later and that’s how Jwala happened.

Ayush Jajoria: The idea behind Jwala was to combine our friendship and love for the similar taste in music into a collective a group thing. Usually the live acts around us inspire us to do more and do it better, and with the help and support from REProduce artists, and Rana Ghose, we get to do that, which is really nice and we can’t thank him enough for it.

Palash Kothari: Bollywood and Commercial ‘EDM’ is huge in India because there’s that kind of an audience. For some reason ‘alternative’ genres haven’t been able to get that coverage barring a few circles in urban cities but that’s changing slowly. Even if I live in a small city, because of the internet I’m exposed to certain genres of music which nobody around me even knows exist, there’s not a lot I can do to further explore my interests except move to a bigger city and that is a financial hustle.

Also, India in general has a very small English-speaking urban population and that too is concentrated in major cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai. There’s also prohibition in a few states and add that to the level of corruption involved at both the lower rungs and the upper rungs of the government…

It’s difficult to get police permission to organise gigs unless you have the connection or the money to bribe and even if you do somehow put something together, the few who show up won’t be able to support your model. You’re limited to a handful of venues in the city who also don’t want to take risks booking acts ‘too experimental’. This is where REProduce comes in.

What are your goals for 2018?

Brij Dalvi: Apart from increasing our reach tremendously, we want to be a more accessible source for electronic music in India, and we want to further facilitate the producer community here in various ways. Because it needs to grow, both in terms of artistic output and fanbase. Small steps at a time!

Interview by Nicholas Burman

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3one3 · 7 years

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The Sequel - 814

Fish Store

André Schürrle, Juan Mata, other Chelsea/BVB players, and random awesome OC’s (okay they’re less random now but they’re still pretty awesome)

original epic tale

all chapters of The Sequel

“Hi hello good afternoon! No you don’t have to call me back.”

“I can if it’s important.”

“This is fine. I just called because I was chopping food and speakerphone is easier than texting. I’ve already eaten the food now. Can I come to the beach next week?”

“When next week?”

“The middle. Or the end.”

“That doesn’t really narrow it down.”

“TWT or FSS but I have to leave in the morning on S. Are you going there or do you have other plans? Schü is with DFB and I want a mini break before WCF.”

“I have to do a thing in Berlin in Tue. I was going to spend a few days there instead of the beach but I can do both.”

“Is anyone going to Berlin with you?”

“Toni, but that can change. Would you like to meet me there and be my translator around town? :) Or do you need the beach?”

“I need *you*. Location not important.”

“Are you ok?”

“Mhm I just know I’m gonna miss you by then and I’ll want to see you before I go to the WCF.”

“Meet me in Berlin Tue evening and we can be tourists for 2 days.”

“K!” About 12 seconds after she sighed with relief and put her phone down, Christina heard André announce his presence in her cozy viewing lounge.

“Anybody home?” he called from by the door, which was in a de facto little hallway made by the glass on one side and the dividing wall for the “cafe” on the other. His girl held her hand up so he could see her. Zoe found the most squishy, rider-swallowing sofa in the entire world to put right up by the windows, which were floor to ceiling in the middle of the room so that one could sink into said couch and still be able to see what was happening in the indoor ring. Christina was laying on it though, and the arms were very tall, so no one could see her there without getting closer. She had a brand new burgundy, monogrammed throw pillow for her head and shoulders, and two very sleepy Toy Fox Terriers in their little coats for her lap. André leaned over the back of the black leather couch to kiss her hello. “Were you napping?” he questioned. No one was riding in the ring below.

“No, I was sulking.” His wife turned her lower lip over and moved her hand from Spencer’s head so that he could pet him too. “Dirk is hurt. Not very hurt. Just a little hurt. Temporarily hurt. But hurt enough that I can’t take him to Omaha.”

Oh for fuck’s sake, the footballer groaned inside under the influence of snap panic. The only thing that could possibly make our situation harder right now is the horse being injured. The world is going to end. This is a disaster. This is-

“Do you want a latte? Or a martini? We have the possibility of both now with the professional espresso machine and the full bar,” Christina pointed out somewhere between sarcasm and resignation. She liked her lounge. There was a nice refrigerator and freezer, a microwave, a blender, the espresso machine, a coffee maker, a full size sink, a drawer full of utensils, cabinets with coffee mugs, plates, and bowls, and even a dishwasher with which to clean all that stuff. There were two square tables for 4, and a wet bar area with a counter and 4 stools. A comfy reclining chair accompanied the couch by the windows, and then there was another sitting area at the far end of the room with two more sofas, a couple of upholstered chairs, coffee and end tables, and even a TV. The walls were burgundy with 12” crisp white adidas stripes at about eye level, and full of poster-size photos, actual posters or framed and matted advertisements and magazine features, and shelves heavy with the spoils of competition. The sheer number of trophies around the large room made Christina feel self-conscious, because all that silverware on show said “major bragging” to her. Zoe insisted on displaying everything.

“No. Are you okay?” André reached to the right to pet Lucky too, who was closer to his mom’s knees. Both dogs were shedding white hair all over her navy breeches and black knee socks, even with their coats on. The effect of Dirk’s injury on her was of much more concern to their dad than her tidiness. She looks awfully relaxed here though, he decided after taking in her state.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just bummed. I wanted him to get to go to a final on his own, without the team. He doesn’t have many chances left, probably. Do you want to sit? I’m willing to lift my legs so you can share this couch with me, but just know they’re coming right back down in your lap if you do. My knee is kiiiiiillling me.” The rider really was okay with her prized stallion’s situation. She was being honest with him, not just pretending, or trying to hide her feelings for his benefit. Also, she was too tired to be upset.

“Why aren’t you icing it?” Her partner moved his hand to the inside of her right knee, over the synthetic suede knee patch part of her breeches, and gently palpated it.

“Puppies like warm laps, not ice.”

“What’s with Dirk? How did he get hurt?”

“Bad step, probably. There’s some swelling in one of his fetlocks. He jogs sound but he didn’t feel right when I got on him. Tom is sure it’ll go down with poulticing. We gave him some horsey Tylenol and he’ll have a few days off with cold hosing and poultice and then we’ll see. I’m not worried. This is too close to feel good about taking him to the Final though, so I changed my entry already,” Christina explained while playing with the unfinished end of her long braid. She believed the couch had claimed her as its own, and was fine with that. There was no desire within her to ever get up, or move other than to pet her pets, put her hands in her track jacket pockets, or rest them on her chest. Her hair ended up there and she could play with it without having to move much. “Rio gets a chance to defend his title. I don’t know if any horse has ever won the World Cup back to back,” she added with a thoughtful and curious lilt.

“There is something you don’t know?”

“Shut up.”

“Do you still want to take Mausi to a fish store today?”

“You’re funny,” she giggled. Who says “fish store”? You go to a pet supply store, or an aquarium supply store even. Maybe in German it’s literally a fish store. She enjoyed the curious and confused look on André’s face while he tried to figure out what she thought was funny, and also how much better he looked since having taken his beard down a notch that morning after her extensive campaigning to get him to shave. He was much more handsome to her when she could see more of his face instead of a dead ginger colored animal clinging underneath it. “I don’t think Luke wants to go anywhere. I just had lunch with him a little while ago and he still seems kinda under the weather. He wasn’t very hungry, or at least not for veggies and chicken and millet. Espen said he just wants to nap and watch TV or hear stories. I have one more lesson to do and then I was gonna go hang with him.”

“When is your lesson?”

“Momentarily.”

“Do you think I should go check on him, or can I sit in the middle of the ring and try to talk to you while you try to teach?”

“I think he’s fine with Espen, babe. He’s better off, from a wellness point of view, with a paid professional than with his noob dad. I don’t really care though. You’re welcome to stay and be bored.”

André was happy to remain and be bored. He made a to-go cup of tea to bring down with him when the resident trainer put her sneakers back on and shooed the dogs down the stairs, around the corner, through the hall, and back into the barn. Footballers were allowed in the indoor, but not terriers. The one who paid for the indoor sat on a jump in there and talked to her whenever she wasn’t telling Stefanie what to do with Julian. He did that before in London sometimes. Sometimes the lesson plan dictated that Christina was going to be talking the entire time, and there was no point in him hanging out. Sometimes the exercise involved more observing and then giving comments or advice sporadically, and she was more than capable of having a conversation about something unrelated while studiously examining every stride and hand movement. Something they talked about that afternoon during the lesson was her plan to spend two nights in Berlin with Juan. That made the player less happy, but not enough to complain. He hoped she’d go to Germany’s friendly on that Wednesday since it was happening right at the Westfalenstadion. She said she probably wouldn’t have gone anyway because it was just a friendly and had “terrible game” written all over it. Whenever the team came together for just one training session before a match, it was indeed a signal that the contest wasn’t very important and probably wouldn’t turn into an all time great.

Better than hanging out during Stefanie’s lesson was hanging out as a family at home afterward. Espen was relieved from duty and the lethargic little prince of the new castle spent his evening alternating between resting on one parent and two, depending on in which way they were resting on each other. They watched a 1981 comedy starring Bill Murray, John Candy, and Harold Ramis, about some friends who join the army. Everyone got rubs. Christina got ankle and knee rubs. Lukas got back rubs. André got head rubs. No one wanted to get up to make dinner. It was supposed to be steak and sweet potato taco night. The blonde boys had to gang up on their chef to get her out bed to do the grilling and the avocado smashing, and then she had to go wake them up to do the eating. André and Christina teamed up for story time. They did a shortened, semi-modernized version of Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, and split up the parts. The rider was better at conjuring different characters for the female roles than the player was at making up different voices and personalities for the male ones. Lukas surely didn’t understand most of what was said, regardless of the acting. He enjoyed it nevertheless, and it did put him to sleep on time.

“Are you going to read to me now?” André yawned when Christina returned to bed after transferring the child to his crib. Bed was base camp for the entire family for about 6 hours, and that was perfect. That was all he wanted on a cold and gray weekday. His girl was okay with it too, and without a literal acknowledgment to herself that a day like that was exactly what she needed for things to start feeling right in their relationship again, she was already feeling the effects of that.

“Can we watch the end of Monaco and Man City? And can I lay on you?”

“You’ve been laying on me for half the day. What makes you think you need permission now?”

“Half the day,” Christina snorted whiled crawling into the spot she wanted, between André’s legs. “My day starts a lot earlier than yours. It’s a lot longer.”

“Poor Prinzessin. Her life is soooooo exhausting.”

“You should suggest Bring Your Girl To Work Day to Tuchel, and I’ll try one of your typical days and then you can try one of mine, and we’ll see which is more tiring.”

“I would like that just because I’d get to spend a whole day with you.” He smooched the side of her head while she moved around to find a comfortable position, and it made her pause, and stop. Did I push a wrong button, he wondered, momentarily disheartened and worried that an innocent peck was no longer acceptable. Christina was pushing on both of his thighs to hold herself up, leaning back against him, intending to fold her legs up a little and then settle into the perfect comfy spot. There was no lowering back down.

“Can you flatten a little so I’m still up here?” she asked timidly.

“What do you mean?”

“When you sit up this straight and I sit in the middle then I’m far away from you.”

“You’re literally going to be laying on me...half of you is touching me...”

“No I mean from your face...” She let go of his thigh to bend her arm and hold his left cheek instead, and leaned over her shoulder to kiss the right cheek. He put an arm around her and slid down some so he wasn’t so upright, and her legs unfolded as they arrived at a sort of natural arrangement where the footballer was like a cozy lounge chair and if the rider turned her head and lifted her chin then she could have all the kisses she wanted. And that was why she didn’t want to be far away from her partner’s face. Kiss convenience suddenly mattered. He was correct to remind her that they’d been at close quarters ever since they got home that day, but that closeness didn’t involve any kissing. He caught himself each time he went to instinctively press his lips into some part of her, afraid of the reaction he’d receive. And Christina saved all of her affectionate pecks for Lukas.

“We should have put this on sooner!” His dad was surprised by the score in Monaco. Pep’s City was headed out as it stood, after a lot of back and forth in terms of goals and away goals.

“I hope y’all get Monaco in the next round if they go through. They don’t believe in defending. It’ll be fun since your team doesn’t believe in it either.”

“Hey.”

“The only way your defense could get worse is if Tuchel put you and Dembele at center half.”

“I was once a very good left back.”

“When you were like 14.”

“You were a really good pony rider when you were 14 and you still are, so...”

“I was also really good at tying my shoes and still am, so...”

“If Guardiola’s team can’t outscore them, what makes you think we can?”

“He doesn’t have a Schü,” Christina smiled, patting the arm wrapped around her and holding up one of her breasts. “Or an Auba,” she added under her breath.

“Marco might be back by then.”

“That’s good.” Sort of. For the team. Not for you.

“Mm.”

The pair of football fans watched the remaining 10 or so minutes of the match in silence. The action on the screen was pretty intense. One goal for Manchester City would have changed everything, and nobody watching the Champions League would have bet against it after what they saw Barcelona do to PSG’s 4-goal advantage taken with them to the Nou Camp. Half of the pair wasn’t actually that into the game. She never liked the Manchester City manager, and decided from the moment André turned the match on that his team was not going to stage a comeback- that he was going out, in shame. She nodded off while her lounger watched intently. Happy place or no happy place, trademarked and capitalized or otherwise, he could still be a very nice place to rest. Christina fell asleep in that place the night before too, just rotated 45* to the right. His breathing was comforting and his smell was familiar, and nice to her nose. And the way his arm felt around her, even when he was sleeping and no matter whether it was truly holding onto her or just resting on her person, was incredibly important.

He didn’t hold her like the wife he was obligated to hold at night, or that he was entitled to hold, or that he was simply in the habit of holding. His hold on her was exactly as passive but necessary as hers on Lukas the baby zebra when she slept alone and felt stressed out, and the same as with all the other important stuffed animals that served lengthy residencies in her bed since she was a toddler. André held her like she was the thing that helped him sleep comfortably at night, without any bad dreams or having to figure out where to put his arms. Christina knew how weird it can be to have to find a good arrangement for one’s arms with nothing to holding onto, when you don’t know if you should just fold them in front of you, or tuck one under your pillow, or fold your legs up and sandwich your hands between your thighs, or stick them out straight, or what. All of those options have pitfalls, like numbness, or just a feeling of awkwardness that leads to restlessness that leads to poor sleep. She was accustomed to falling asleep with one arm tucked gently to her body and the other on her partner’s chest or stomach, or having a forearm in front of her own chest to hold onto, or a hand there to engage in some way. Even if the arm didn’t make it in between hers, it could just hang over hers and kind of lock them in so they didn’t want to move around. If the arm and the hand just rested on her hip, or her thigh when she curled up, then she could put hers on top of it and it would stay there as if docked to the other limb. Sometimes she could hold a whole person in her arms and then really not have to figure out what to do with them. Without a partner for bedtime, only a stuffed animal could provide the rider with an easy and comfortable arm solution, and only an easy and comfortable arm solution could make sleeping alone feel all right, or make sleep in general come quickly and peacefully. She felt “not alone” with André’s one arm around her during the match, and that made it easy to nod off.

Most nights, in another time, he would have felt rather inconvenienced by that. Having to keep his legs apart and being unable to straighten them out wasn’t the most comfortable position, and it was early still. Most nights, it would be annoying to get trapped there, and he would shamelessly wake his wife to get freedom to find a more comfortable arrangement, or even to go do something elsewhere, without her. Sometimes he played video games when she went to bed early. Sometimes he just watched TV in another room with the dogs. He thought about that while he watched the post-match breakdown by the pundits who were as eager as Christina to tear Guardiola apart for his team’s performance. “Most nights” hasn’t been a thing for us in over a year, he realized. You can’t have a “most nights” when you don’t have enough nights to distinguish between “most” and “some” or “a few”. It’s nice to be inconvenienced this way when the real “most nights” is wishing there was a girl around to turn your thighs into armrests and pass out on you. When did she switch from white v-necks to black, I wonder. She had one of the white ones on last night, but every other night she’s been home and I’ve been home she has black. Is that like a reflection of her mood? Is she in permanent mourning? It’s too bad I won’t be home tomorrow night. We only seem to have two nights in a row together and we have to spend the first one fighting, or having heinous life conversations. I just want to do nothing with her. Or go on a date! I thought last Sunday was going to be like an all-day date, but she barely talked to me. It was like she went on an all-day date with Mausi and her phone. I can’t believe I won’t see her for a month. Does she understand that I’m upset that I won’t see her for a month even when seeing her is more often unpleasant for me than nice? Doesn’t that count for anything?

André used his girl’s topknot to scratch a little itch on the side of his nose, and considered what to do next. The inconvenience of being made into a lounge chair for a napping beauty was actually really great for the time being. Trapped and immobilized was fine for him since it wasn’t a “most days” situation- it was a rare exception, to be savored. But he didn’t know how long he could remain still and comfortable for the object of most of his problems, and he wanted to do other things with her besides serve as furniture. He wanted to talk more, since they were able to do that. He wanted to work on the affection deficit. He wanted sex too, and not just because he physically missed it. The more Christina went off to do things with Juan, the more André felt he needed to be with her to remind her what they had together, and to reassure himself that they still had it. Part of him was very jealous of the sexual relationship his wife had with his old teammate, and he did know how unusual it is for someone to believe only a fraction of his conscious was worried about something like that. For most people, all of them would be freaking out about it. For most people, he believed, a spouse having any sexual relationship with someone else would be a huge deal. He just accepted it. He encouraged it because he thought it was good for his relationship, and good for Christina. It was getting more and more difficult for him though. Letting his girl hook up with her best friend now and then was fine when they had a vibrant, healthy, happy sex life. Despite her assurances that they weren’t sleeping together that often, the Borussia player felt as if that relationship was starting to take the place of his own sexual one with her. That kind of thinking didn’t blend well with his football struggles.

Feeling inadequate and treated like an underperformer at work- at his passion- was not best complemented by the same at home. Two of the things he missed most that night were the authentically appreciative pat on the back from his manager, and the little squeaking sound Christina made when she was maximum-level turned on. He missed contributing value on the pitch and in his sheets. He almost didn’t even miss the feeling of being free from stress and conflict anymore because it had been so long since he experienced it. It was practically forgotten. He wished for it the way one does for something he’s never known, instead. For much of his life, André missed tranquility at work and at home the way Christina missed soda and espresso whenever she tried to drop or cut back on caffeine. He’d come to want that tranquility more like the way 6 or 7-year-old Christina wished to go to The Lost Forest to meet puggles and flying pigs.

What does Prinzessin dream about these days, he wondered as he let the hand on her tummy move a little, to rub gently. Being on an Olympic podium? Riding in the jump off at the World Cup to defend her title? Or more mundane things, like a morning without crunches and side plank dips to maintain these, he considered, a finger following a contouring line down the side of her abs. Playing with penguins? I could see that. I could see her playing on an ice slide with a ton of penguins. She would wear that wool hat with the furry ball on top and it would bounce around when she laughs, which would be the whole time, probably. Her dreams aren’t usually nice though. They’re crazy, and anxiety driven I think. She’s always telling me about having to run or hide from bad guys, or being confused at the airport because she can’t get to the right gate. She hasn’t told me about any dreams in a while. I am torn between wanting her to have a nice dream right now and wanting to tickle her, the footballer thought with the beginnings of a mischievous smirk. It would probably cause World War III. “I’m so tired and you can’t even let me sleep for 5 minutes because you need attention wah wah wah”. I do need attention. What’s wrong with needing attention? Isn’t it flattering when someone wants your attention? I like it when she sits next to me and quietly pokes my arm until I acknowledge her, like a cat touching somebody with his paw and staring. I like when I’m trying to talk to Papa on the phone and she starts taking clothes off and pretending it’s not to get attention, or she walks through the room in some ridiculous underwear like it’s normal to change into a thong for bedtime. I’m quite tired too, André yawned in conclusion. I guess I can stay relatively still for her a while more. No sooner had he prepared to convince his legs to stop complaining about being stuck in their current position did the girl keeping them there begin to move.

“Love you,” Christina murmured sleepily while turning to the left and trying to pull her bare legs up close to her upper body. She wanted his chest for a cheek pillow instead of for the back of her head. Her eyes didn’t want to open, and they didn’t. André took advantage of the opportunity to straighten his legs. He was still going to be stuck in an uncomfortable position, especially since his wife had just managed to wriggle her way to trapping his crotch under her hip, and her feet were pushing flat against his inner thigh.

“What are you dreaming about, Prinzessin?” he inquired.

“Sebastian Vettel,” was the not very awake sounding response.

“Oh.”

“He’s gonna...win in...two weeks. Held.”

Little known fact, the player narrated to the imaginary audience in his head while petting hers. Chris always calls Vettel her hero in German, never “hero” in English, because she saw a VT that the BBC did with German fans for the German Grand Prix forever ago and she thought it was really emotional and a bunch of people in it called him their “held” and now each time he does something impressive, or just impressive to her, like when he’s disappointed with being second even when everyone else is thrilled with what he did, she thinks “mein held”. I hope she starts telling me things like that again. I like the inner workings of her head. I love them, actually. They’re what make her special. I’m happy that she’s having dreams about her hero though. That’s a good sign.

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