What is happening to me?

Today at work, one of my coworkers--one of the new receptionists--came to ask me if reports could be generated that list our current students (the international ones) by country. I said that it was possible, but why? Apparently another well-trusted office was trying to find a student's last name. All they knew was the first name of the student and the country of origin. I asked what the country of origin was, and the first name. You know, for giggles. She told me the student's country--Kazakhstan--and the first name. Within nanoseconds I was writing the student's last name on a Post-It. This particular student's last name is ELEVEN LETTERS LONG, and oh, in Kazakh. The new receptionist looked aghast as I did it, like she was watching a lemur feed on a flyblown carcass. Or maybe it was surprise. I dunno. When all was said and done I thought, my GOD, there are about 3500 internationals here. How in the hell did I remember that? Is it my penchant for the bizarre? Was it just a name that stuck out from the sea of thousands? I think both are true, but I also think that I have flung myself into the abyss of insanity. There is no going back. If I start having those dreams where I am fussing with student's files and I wake up and grope for them in the bed next to me, I will have to see the Nice Lady With The Big Couch again.

I used to think that I would give just about any of my random knowledge up for something "useful", like the ability to do mental math. I may be unstoppable when I play Trivial Pursuit, but in the end I thought that knowledge of the capital of Namibia (Windhöek) or the color of a giraffe's tongue (black) could be sacrificed so that I could add a bloody check up in my head. Now I embrace it. How else could I survive three language's worth of things like learning how to say "I want to buy the fish of my brother Raoul"? Benim kardeşimin balığı almayı istiyorum. Oh yeah. Feel that weird. I got my undergraduate in anthropology, which I love dearly; had I been more "grounded" how could I have lived through classes like "Gender and Anthropology" where every week we watched some disturbing movie about such heartwarming topics as female genital mutilation (female circumcision)? I did my research with be-turbaned South Asians (Sikhs) in Boston and San Francisco, and as I sat in the semidarkness of a langar hall at 7 AM eating curried potatoes and lentils with roti bread and steaming Indian chai surrounded by pictures of deceased Sikh militants grinning with AK-47s strapped to their chests, I thought: now I am home.

I beg you: embrace your inner freak. S/he needs to be let out and petted and appreciated for his/her own worth. After all, they may be far more useful than you think one day.

Good night, Indiana.

Dom