I just spent 5 days in Bonn, working with Ludovico Il Magnifico on the theory of hyperbolic marimbas. A collection of results of great importance, fundamental dare I say, that will be made public soon. Actually, the last name of this guy is Battista, but Il Magnifico fits better: he cooked twice for me, it was enormous fun to work with him, and he let me make fun of him as much as my heart desired. Anyways, I also talked math with a bunch of other people, and gave a talk of which posterity will only remember that apparently I described as “a sign of creativity” the fact that I was considering circles of length 2 instead of 1 or $2\pi$. Anyways, for the standards of my parasitic lifestyle, I worked a lot. And that was good.

Bonner Altstadt

The weather in Bonn was fantastic. Kölsch was Kölsch. The cherry trees were flowering. There were plenty of terraces. Not much has changed, but what is new is for the better. But what was great was to see a bunch of people I had not seen for a long time. Indeed, after living in Bonn between 1993 and 2004, I have been back only a few times since I left. The last time was 10 years ago.

When I arrived in Bonn, I loved it, but that is not surprising. Everything was new and interesting. I had been living at home until then, and now I could do as I pleased. Blessedly, the absence of cell phones meant that, at least for quite a while, inquiries about what I was up to just happened during the weekly visit to a phone booth to call back to Spain. Other than that, I was totally free to do what I wanted and when I wanted. There is no way that in Spain I would have felt free to spend 5 hours a day having lunch and drinking really cheap bad coffee, talking life, history, books, flea markets, Turkish food, or whatever else. And then there is no way I would have met people like that Argentinian gay guy who paid his bills by performing phone sex, if that is the verb, while ironing his clothes.

I was free, people were new, and I loved it. “People were new” is somehow the key. And not only because there were kinds of people I had never met, but also because they were just new. Different individuals than those that I knew and who knew me. Indeed, this was the first time I felt how much one can reinvent oneself when one moves and changes milieu. After years in school, everybody, starting with myself, had a pretty much fixed idea of who I was. And well, these ideas might at first have been a truthful reflection of reality, but when one changes, people do not revisit one’s role in the world, the personage that is assigned to one. At least, it sometimes happens that people’s perception of who one is changes slower than one does. And that includes oneself. So, I arrived in Bonn, felt liberated from expectations to be “as Juan is.” I was a blank canvas for everybody else, and I liked that what I saw that other people were seeing fit me much better than what had been before. That liberated me enormously. Funnily, this is still reflected by the fact that as a general rule, I am much more willing to take risks in German or English than in Spanish.

Now, all of that lasted for a long time, but by the end of my time in Bonn, I was again feeling entrapped in a role that was not who I was. Moving to the US was again a highly liberating experience. I was once again a blank canvas, free to reinvent myself. With the Atlantic between me and those who had been seeing me for years, I could reset my life in ways that reflected much better who I was at the time. The same happened, on a smaller scale, when I moved to France. Although I didn’t move anywhere, it seems to me that COVID and the birth of the being had the same kind of effect, albeit in smaller scale.

After all these changes, I have always had a hard time going back to my previous life, reentering the world I had left. This has made it hard for me to go back to places where I used to live, to meet people I used to talk to all the time. Since I am in any case highly talented at not answering emails and phone calls, in saying “mañana, mañana” every time I have to do something that feels “involved” but that could also wait until tomorrow, I ended up functionally going no-contact with people I had spent lots of time with. Not by design—just functionally. I am sure that people wondered why I disappeared from the surface of the Earth, probably finding it incomprehensible and upsetting. I am not proud of that behavior, and I am sure that a shrink, a life coach, or even ChatGPT would advise me to act differently. But I am not sure I can. And I am totally sure that I couldn’t.

Anyways, in the last couple of years—it must have been again after my inner me changed again, I assume—I have been making an effort to reconnect with certain people from the past. People who gave me a lot and whom I miss. Okay, I have been making an effort to make the effort, but that counts as making the effort. We call that attempting to self-improve. Anyways, however one thinks about it, the whole endeavor has been much more successful than I would have thought.

I just said that I have been making the effort. Well, I was being way too nice to myself, because it is these people who deserve all the credit. In fact, often—not always— it has been them who have contacted me, maybe to wish me a happy birthday or something. The effort I made was not to give in to thinking “mañana, mañana”, instead taking the time to write an email telling about my life—a long email because there was a lot to tell—or at least sending a message back engaging in the conversation or whatever.

I am amazed that that little has served to restart relationships that had been long-time dormant, although “nonexistent” might be a better fit. Many of my most recent WhatsApp messages are from people who, after having me for years under 0223—— or 773——, had not had my number for at least as many years. Many of these people might not be enlightened enough to have moved to Signal, but talking and hanging out with them has been great. I am happy for the generosity that they have shown.

Cauliflower

When A. learned that I was going to be in Bonn, he wrote to say hi. We ended up hanging out quite a bit, and he made a valiant effort to cook a meatless dinner. T. drove from Cologne to eat with us. After A. wrote, I decided to spend some of my train time—thanks to the Deutsche Bundesbahn, I had a lot of time—Googling some people. I didn’t find most of them, but I wrote to Y. I didn’t see her because now she is a high school teacher and lives elsewhere. She answered, and I thought of directly answering back, but I have not yet. I would have if Camavinga and the referee had shown a bit more common sense, but after that game, I had to wait until next week: if I remember it right, T., her boyfriend of the time and husband now, is a Bayern fan. I had also tried to find N.H. but had failed. But he found me. Thanks to A., I must say. I was crossing the Münsterplatz talking on the phone to A., who characteristically kept calling to change plans: 5 times in the time it took to cross that Platz. N.H. happened to be there and must have recognized my accent in German and my general shape because he came after me to say hi. We had a beer the next day, but unfortunately, S.H. could not join. That was a different “H.” there. I am actually not sure why I am not writing full names, but as it may be, I saw a lot of faces from the deep, deep past. And it was great.

Now I am on my way back, writing this—thanks to the Deutsche Bundesbahn, I got a lot of time. I am happy to go back to the cats, to the figs, to check out if the apricots are moving along, to the being, and to the cauliflower grower. But it will definitely not take 10 years for me to go back to Bonn. I mean, after the magnificent talk I gave, they will surely want to invite me again…