I recently had a dream about the aquarium.
I try out new ways of thinking with the ease of putting on and taking off a coat. The only rule is that there are no rules. I think in mash-up, I think in rhyme. I think in dreams—which is to say i get lost in the stories that other people tell me about their dreams. I think when I’m jogging. I think when I’m all alone in a crowd and when I’m watching someone’s mouth move. I think about things and then I think about the words that make up those things. It changes from what they mean to how they look and sound. The entire thought becomes a collage that isn’t ready until the last piece has been applied. A bit here, a bit there—I add and take away words like a painter dabbing the canvas with a brush. I try to concentrate on one small task at a time. Like writing one sentence or running one Google Image search. In this way, I can create art in a cubicle, in the midst of email attachments, intercom buzzes, instant message nudges and various internet time sinks and never feel overwhelmed. The important thing to remember is that everything can be used—even the so-called wasted moments. Among the greatest revolutionaries are those who were able to turn a prison cell into the Eye of the world. A life can be ended but an idea can not. It can be burnt and pulverized and blasted into powder but it will only become stronger.
I wrote a scene in which a woman puts out a Craigslist ad and hires sexy women to sit around cutting up the only existing paper copy of her novel manuscript (the hard drive and disc versions having been deleted) using long silver scissors. They were instructed to cut the pages line by line, turning a pile of paper into a pile of curling fortune cookie streamers. The author collected all the pieces and shook them up in a plastic garbage bag. Then she pulled them out, one or two at a time without looking, and these lines became the basis for the lyrics for the album that the book turned into..an album that would go viral online, until it was broadcast across all the internets…
