Six Hours Above the Stage
In an antique warehouse in Venlo, one end of an MBA graduation lived on a laptop. The other put my white-robed face above the stage for six hours.
AI reconstructionAndrew and I arrived in Venlo after Crete, entering the quieter family orbit that waited beyond the island. One of its rooms was not quiet at all: a warehouse filled with antiques, belonging to the husband of Andrew’s mother.
During that stay, I joined what I remember as the graduation conference for the senior cohort of a Big Data and AI MBA. I attended by Zoom from a MacBook on a heavy wooden table. On the other end of the call, my image was broadcast on the large screen above the stage.
I remember sitting there for roughly six hours in my white galabia. Andrew and I had stocked up on pre-rolled joints, so smoke breaks became punctuation in a very long academic day. I was completely stoned—and completely attentive.
One timestamp, one recollection, two rooms
The photograph gives the reconstruction a clock point. The rest of the duration remains remembered rather than measured.
The joke and the ceremony were both real to me.
The absurdity did not cancel the seriousness. I was delighted by what I understood as Israel’s progress along the AI trajectory: the sense that an entire field, and an entire country’s relationship to it, was moving quickly into view.
On one side of the call: graduates, a stage, and a public ceremony. On the other: old clocks, dark wood, smoke, and objects from other centuries. My face hovered over the future while my body sat among the past.
Where were you?
In Venlo, among antiques.
And where did they see you?
Above the stage.
For how long?
I remember six hours. The photograph proves only one of them.
The future was graduating. I watched from a warehouse full of other centuries.