I was tagged for a meme in which one reveals eight random things about oneself, with the additional suggestion that since I am not in my usual location, I may be learning new things about myself.
I said that I had already completed a similar meme; that this blog already reveals more about its author than was originally intended, and more than I am entirely comfortable with; that the speaker in this blog, not the author, is its main focus and character; that this speaker is a sculpted detail from the Casa de la Muerte in Copán, speaking from the Blackground, and does not have a personal life you could understand, or any peculiarities beyond those which are already public knowledge.
I also said that although the personal is political, one thing I appreciate about the French speaking world is that people there, unlike the Americans, value privacy, and that since I, the author, am in Mexico, which is familiar to me and where I feel at home, as opposed to Louisiana and the United States where I am out of place in many ways, I am precisely not stretching my wings and discovering new things about myself, but relaxing into my own cocoon, taking a rest from doubt and self-discovery, and just being who I always was.
However, during my voyage I have actually been reminded of some true facts, or had them thrown sharply into relief before me. I have eight revelations:
1. While I enjoy travel as much as anyone, I am far more interested in residence outside the United States. And seeing the Seven Wonders of the Modern World does not interest me nearly as much as does experiencing daily life otherwise.
2. It is really true that where I normally live is for me an impoverished environment – even in the periods in which I am taking full advantage of everything it offers. All my doubts about where my true interests lie fall away the moment I find myself in a place where I can touch them. I am also very distracted in the United States, because I am so uncomfortable there.
3. The key to my enjoying the American academic life, and putting its vicissitudes into perspective, is or would be to arrange for four months a year, every year, of fieldwork abroad. People have often told me that “abroad” is not reality, “home” is, and that I need to get used to this, but I disagree. Many people do spend that much time abroad, but I have never been able to arrange for it consistently. I need to figure out how.
4. One thing I do not like about Latin America is the noise. Most circumstances here are noisy – unless, of course, you have mansion with a wall around it, a cabin in the mountains, or some similarly unusual situation. What I do not understand is how people sleep through this noise, but many seem to do so or at least not to complain. The noise comes from construction sites, engines, loudspeakers, and televisions.
5. Reeducation stripped away everything I had learned from meditation and seriously distorted my emotional reactions to things – I realize this more and more, the more I detach myself from its presuppositions, judgments, and values. It is shocking to see. Reeducation also had a very unhealthy obsession with the past. One was to torture oneself about the past, and it was a sin to live in the present or look forward without dragging the past like the proverbial ball and chain. Reeducation was abusive and the primary objective of abuse is not simply to harm now, but to effect long-term distortion.
6. Sleep is important. This has become especially obvious because in Mexico I am prevented from sleeping half the time not by my own choice but by the noise. It is amazing how clearly one can think when one has slept, and how grotesque life seems when one has not.
When I became a professor, I gave up sleeping so as to have time for myself. I always stay up as late as possible because I have left campus and I am pleased to be gone. I do not want to think of the morning and my return. I also want to have a concrete and simple explanation for why I feel unwell. And sleep deprived states tone down my natural exuberance and dull my mind, so that I fit in better with my day to day world.
Life, however, is better with sleep, and here I am not afraid to sleep because I look forward to, and do not dread the next day. Perhaps as I drop the shackles of Reeducation, I will find that this rule applies in the United States as well.
7. I need a T-shirt, for the benefit of persons from Louisiana to Zacatecas and beyond, proclaiming: “I am not in the mood for casual sex, and even if I were, it is still unlikely that I would be interested in casual sex with you.”
8. I used to live each day well or badly, as they came, and then go on to the next one. This was wisdom. Reeducation was like getting stuck on flypaper because anything bad that happened was always already our fault and a symptom of our defectiveness, and never just one of those things.
Axé.
coldhearted scientist وداد 
Is there any possibility that you can live abroad? It sounds as though it really suits you (except for the noise).
This is my question too. The problem has always been that academic jobs in the places I want them, do not pay. I mean, they seriously do not pay. You need a spouse in business, or a trust fund, or at least to have inherited a house that is paid off. That is why so many Latin American academics have U.S. jobs. But I am now in posession of a house that could perhaps be parlayed into another house – elsewhere. I think I should start seriously working toward this goal. Last year in Trinidad I thought: I could be a desirable hire here. In Mexico I have a feeling I am a dime a dozen, I do not know whether I would be a desirable hire, but it is desirable to me. They have the largest bookstore in Latin America and being there reminds me of being at the Library of Congress. And who knows – it may be more possible than I think.
I know I’ve had very limited experience, but the eight days I was in Mexico, even though I spent most of the time in cities, I didn’t find it noisy except right in the middle of a marketplace and never at night. If I can’t sleep, I don’t like life as much.
CS – you call Cholula a *city* – ? It’s a village!