Origin of the Idea

Blue paragraphs are guidance for how each following black paragraph should be read and are not read aloud. 

Link https://sites.google.com/view/calvinballvariations/home/origin-of-the-idea or a QR Code, or an instagram link, so the audience can read along.

The piece begins with its title, which can be read in any way deemed appropriate by the performer, simply or with great emphasis, repeated many times or even ignored completely. Additional context about the art project can be provided or not.

1. Origin of the Idea.

Sitting scholar

A sitting position is taken. Except for the speaking mouth, there is no physical movement, and the eyes move only enough to read. The voice speaks slowly with deep tones, precision, and an academic diction that verges on being boring. This is countered by significant variation in pace, emphasis, and pitch. The reader puts great effort into imbuing a sense of meaning in each word spoken, into speaking with gravitas. This is achieved not only through the variety of ways that the voice changes (pace, emphasis, pitch) in response to the meaning of the words and sentences, but also through pauses. Words and sentences are followed by pauses, signaling that the meaning of them is so dense and layered that understanding them requires that we stop. 

2. This idea may never have an actual end. Of course it will, but I have this funny sense that it will last much longer than any idea which is so silly has any business lasting. (I have more riddles for here in draft versions, ways to draw out the academic explanations and prose mazes, but cut them, and may reintroduce them.)

(note- the below is a maze, a fun one, but not so necessary, and may be cut. Regardless, it needs to be worked in)

This idea may never have an actual end. It is moving in a space and adapting its form to wherever it is in that space, which implies a ending, because everything which moves in a space will eventually occupy every location in a given space, and everything which change forms will eventually assume every form possible given its mass.  

/This idea may never have an actual end, but of course it will, of course it will-- our dying sun and collapsing universe will end everything eventually, but still, this particular idea may last longer than any idea has any business lasting. /Things can return to an earlier location and reassume a prior form, but repetition is limited, and . We like to think that immaterial things, such as ideas, can go over an over and over, but the limitation on repetition applies not only to stuff but to thinkings. I don't know if ideas have more or less tolerance for repetition, but it is stranger. They occupy more space to begin with, and so get to   having a stranger tolerance for repetition. They are although they so therefore occupy more locations in a space to begin with, as their forms are more intricate so therefore harder to recreate. Regardless, eventually, the space is filled and the shapes are exhausted. This filling and exhaustion is a kind of end. Let's take another pass at this.

/as all things get swallowed up by downing turtles and dying suns

/an end, but this one . We think that ideas aren't things, we s an idea, it is a thing, can protest all we like, but all ideas must be things. They can be immaterial things, but must still be things, and as all things must, they move in space and adapt their forms to the space through which they move. All things must move and take shapes, and all ideas must be things. All this is to say that all ideas have an ending, because everything which moves in a space will eventually occupy every location in that space, and everything which changes forms will eventually assume every possible form. Things can come back to a place, as they reassume a prior form, but repetition is limited, and this limitation applies to things that are material as well as ideas, with ideas perhaps having a slightly stranger tolerance for repetition. They are although they so therefore occupy more locations in a space to begin with, as their forms are more intricate so therefore harder to recreate. Regardless, eventually, the space is filled and the shapes are exhausted. This filling and exhaustion is a kind of end. Let's take another pass at this.

Pause and repeat, then more warmth 

There is a pause, (this instruction is based on an earlier draft where the above paragraph had a bunch of conceptual mazes, but I got lost in them and didn't have a reason for them being there, so I cut them. They are in a side draft in case I want to revive that weird opening) then the above is repeated, but a little bit faster. Otherwise, the earlier instructions regarding no physical movement and a deep but modulated voice still apply. The piece then continues below, in the same frozen body and deep lingering voice, though with less academic precision and more warmth.

3. Interestingly, with regards to this particular idea, I keep finding new spaces and forms for it, raising a hope that the idea may avoid fulfillment and exhaustion, that it may never have an actual end. This hope might be a delusion, but it could be an intuition, or perhaps a premonition. It may even possibly be a logical conclusion, because each newfound space and form seems to suggest several more, and that in my life I won't come close to its ending, and that others may continue to find new ways of moving and transforming it, indefinitely. Whether or not such happens, I think such is possible. This idea may never have an actual end. 

Pause, Then smile and read. (The cartoonishly academic tone of voice fades and becomes more natural.)

4. But it did have a beginning. 

Tiny pause for tiny foot taps

A pause is taken, one so short that it's barely noticeable but still an actual pause. In this pause the performer starts to tap their feet, softly and barely noticeable. The tapping continues as the sentence is spoken.  

5. A few years ago, my mind got taken over by a runaway jackhammer. 

"Restless feet" starts

The foot tapping continues and follows the spoken words. At first it hides behind the words, but slowly become an additional means to add meaning to them, gravitas (pace, emphasis, pitch, pauses; and now the feet.)

6. I thought a lot, and in every direction, and all the time. I couldn't stop it, and I couldn't direct it. It went in every direction, and all the time.  

feet picking up and becoming defined: rapid alternating foot taps imitating a jackhammer, such jackhammer becoming more frantic and chaotic, or less frantic and chaotic, depending on the content and intensity of the writing. They respond to the aloud words. 

(To cut?) The foot tapping continues to respond to the words read aloud. This little bits of sentences below have a lot of funny rhythm and repetition, and the foot tapping can mimic this, as well as enhance the reading and remind the reader not only of the rhythms but also the pauses.

7. In the quietest dark of the night and in the loudest screaming shining sunlight day. As the sun rose and as it set, in shadow and light, and even in the fucking penumbras that define the boundaries between shadow and light, I found myself drowning and thinking and drowning and thinking, there was a runaway jackhammer in my mind. 

Stomp

The next sentence is hard, and the feet respond by hard stomping.  

8. Thoughts came and I fucking thought them. 

Song tapping

Pause and resume both the tapping and the stomping, with the tapping trying to conjure melodies in the words.

9. They were were angry, or they were sad. 

Sometimes it was the loud anger of a fist rushing at concrete, 

sometimes the frozen anger of feeling a broken hand. 

Sometimes is was the loud sadness of torn clothes and hair full of ashes, sometimes the quiet sadness of regret. 

They crashed down hills and sulked in the valleys below. 

Occasionally they were hopeful and wise, occasionally they ascended, but such seemed merely more space for thinking horribly and sadly and harder descents. 

Stomping hard with the first line, then soft with the second.

10. There was no meaning to them, because they went all the time, and in every direction

so they had no direction, and so they had no time. 

Pause, then resume reading and having restless feet, (tapping rather than stomping.)

11. I thought in great volumes but to little effect;

indifferent and compelled, 

manic and flat, 

joyous and enduring. 

Angry and sad. I thought in great volumes, but to no effect.

Stop and read with feeling

Restless feet stop the next paragraph, which is read with more emotional emphasis.

12. I like thinking, I cherish it even. I have a funny brain, one that does encounter the world directly, but also so so reflectively. I really like reflecting, and might even say that I'm skilled at its craft. It's always gotten away from me, and then it left me behind, and my joyous bouncy reflections became something else.  

Restless feet go again, chaotic but muted.

13. I thought in great volumes and all the time and in every direction, but to no effect. 

(To cut?) Alternate the restless feet

My thoughts couldn't fix my broken life, and my broken life couldn't fix my broken thoughts. Neither had broke first-- the breaking occurred through the conversation between my mind and the world.  And it wasn't caused by the things that had happened to me nor the things I had done to myself; again, the breaking occurred in the conversation between the sufferings I had caused and the sufferings I had endured. I blamed the world no less and no more than I blamed myself. I wanted to blame neither, because we both had erred and we both had done right. It wasn't my fault, and it wasn't yours, but the runaway jackhammer blamed both and all, going in all directions all the time.  I thought all the time and in every direction, but to no effect. 

Less chaos in the feet tapping, more steady in rhythm and strength. Like walking.

14. Many days I couldn't get out of bed, but some days I could. Some days I could get to the library, and some days I could walk in the park. So I would go to the library or I would walk in the park.

Come to standing as the sentence is spoken.

1. I tried to walk, and I did. I walked. 

Back restless feet (matching and emphasizing and adding rhythm to the spoken words), but from a position of standing. Softly marching in place.

2. I tried to run. I'm not a serious runner, but here and there in this life I have been able to run, and run hard. 

I tried to run, but it was hard, usually too hard, so I would stop. Then I would try again, then stop again. I kept trying. I wasn't able to run, but I was able to try to run.

Marching in place, but less softly, and less steadily.

3. It didn't stop the jackhammer, and the jackhammer very much did stop the running. 

I would try to run, but mostly I stopped. 

I tried running against the jackhammer, but you can't run against a jackhammer, so I stopped. 

I walked and stopped. I tried to run, but I had to stop, and again, but maybe I could walk. I  couldn't stop the jackhammer. It's just not something we can do. Sometimes the jackhammer does pause though, it pauses for a tiny readjustment, and I could run in that tiny moment. I could run, but not for long. Mostly I walked under that jackhammer.

Starting to walk around the room, stepping with varying rhythm and force, but now mobile, wandering. 

4. But I could walk, so that's what I did. Feeling sad and angry and regretful and resentful, taken over by a jackhammer. But a step at a time, I could make the jackhammer follow me.  and overall shitty ruminations, but they were ruminations, rather than that jackhammer (to fix: the running didn't stop the jackhammer, and the transition between being able to pause the jackhammer enough to make it into a rumination)

Cut: too dramatic. Talk, then a comma into this sentence, you a freeze, then you are taking a knee, then breathing really hard into the microphone as the stopping breathing is described after the last comma. Then put the microphone down and read the rest without amplification.

5. Sometimes, especially at first, the ruminations did become that fucking jackhammer again, and I had to stop walking, even standing, even breathing.

Keep moving the legs in response to the words. Now, you're standing and can really move around. Start slowly, follow a step behind the pace of the spoken words, but follow them.

6. As I walked, the rumination would ease off and just become thinking, and so I could start running again. At first, the restarted running and thinking were soft, but as I kept going, they grew harder. Soft running and soft thinking. Then moderate running and moderate thinking. Then running and thinking harder, and soon enough I was in full sprint and screaming brain, going farther faster than I had lungs for... so I would walk again. I would walk and ruminate and huff and puff, until was able to just think and breathe easily. On and on like that, in cycles of running and ruminating and walking and thinking.  

Prior instruction continues (the legs move in response to the words) but walk around the room a bit, and use the space. Also, in this paragraph, the jackhammer has faded, and become something new. You are mobile , but still stepping normally

7. Slowly, the sledgehammer brain eased off. I still can't believe it did, but it did. I still bleed, but I stopped bleeding out. Otherwise,  I kept up the mixed intervals of thinking, sprinting, and walking. I was ablt to run again. And walk, and stand. So I ran, I walked, I stood., un varying and strange intervals, I ran I walked I stood. I imagined the sky, I felt the dirt. I heard myself... Intermittently, in  circuits and intervals. 

Prior instruction continues, but you start stepping abnormally

8.  In these intervals, I found myself making up stories. I don't remember the stories, and they were more like dreams anyway- nonsense premises, disconnected causation, fantastical conclusions. I would be chasing demons from familiar places for strange reasons, then the demons became FDR but also my grandmother and a close friend, and together we jumped over fallen trees into labyrinthian fields, and we walked those labyrinths so delicately, lest we wake the minotaur. All of this I would promptly forget. My running pace varied, my thinking varied, but my forgetting was consistent. A variety of stories took shape. They evaporated as quickly as they formed. Over time, they lingered, and stopped evaporating so quickly. As stories, they remained nonsense. As ideas, they took more time to boil away, but still boiled away. As feelings, they became a bit more substantial. My mind and body moved, they spoke to each other, and as I did more of both, the conversation became more and more interesting.

Movement stops for this sentence.

9. What were they talking about? 

Start taking funny steps or pausing to take funny poses.  

10. They weren't telling stories, not exactly. A slice of a story would arise here and there, but more as anecdote or emphasis, and not really as narrative. They weren't talking about me and my troubles nor my happiness; I had managed to move the ruminations to a space where I could manage them better, so this was no longer my overriding concern. Sometimes they seemed to talk about ideas, about philosophy, or history and politics and science and literature, but again, thoughts about these things were more tangential and in support of another conversation rather than being about the things themselves. My mind and body weren't talking about nothing either- it wasn't some perfect Zen experience where you deliberately focus on your breathing and reach a place of calm. I wasn't disturbed, though I certainly wasn't calm. I was listening, and starting to pay really close attention to the conversations between my mind and body. Breathing and physical sensation, and peace even came up in their conversations, but that's not what they were talking about. What were they talking about? I wasn't sure, after many hours running. Hours running in many days, days running in many weeks running, then a good three months of this. After a few months of running and listening, I still didn't know what they were talking about. But, I sensed that it was interesting, worth trying to capture and create something with. There was something in their conversation, something really interesting, but I really didn't know what they were talking about.

Mimic the Sand-walk from Dune

11. Oddly enough, my first clue came while watching the movie Dune and seeing the characters sand-walk. In the deserts of Arrakis, rhythmic sounds attract gigantic sandworms, so characters walk in a strange slow dance in order to break up their rhythm, and mimic the sounds of the desert. My mind and body seemed to be discussing how to think and run arrhythmically. The next time you walk, try to do so without pattern while maintaining coherence and momentum. Then try to do that when you run. And then try to do it while you think. Arrythmia is surprisingly difficult. But also rather fun. My mind and body were working on this, and supporting each other in their efforts. Arrythmia. Hmmm... it wasn't the overall topic of conversation between my brain and body, but it was a specific subtopic, and I realized I was getting closer to understanding their discussions. 

Silly walking!

12. Thinking about the Monty Python sketch about Silly Walks pushed me farther forward, something ridiculous. The mind had an intention and told the body It was  some sort of creation of an intention in movement, and them moving that way created an intention in thought, and the body thought and the mind moved, 

13. , and then remembering Calvinball from Calvin and Hobbes made it click. My mind and body were playing and talking about games. Weird games, the kind that didn't lack rules, but also didn't have them. This is strange- how can a game have and not have rules? Oh! Rule creation games. That's what they were doing. Make up a rule, and then play with it, adjust it, think more about it, run in a funny way according to a rule and see how that rule affects the running, then imagine a whole rule set and run with a slant according to the structure of that set, then reformat and walk and think, then sprint again, then think of another rule set and see how that one could interact with the current rule set, play with it in movement. Imagine and move.  

14. If I could figure out a way to catch and share some of this, I would have an art form. 

(*Author's note at #6: the more time I spend crafting and editing a piece of writing, the more intricate and essential its layers of repetition and rhythm become. It isn't clear to me if these efforts make the layers more pronounced and discernable, or just convoluted and impenetrable. Nor is it clear whether any piece of writing's internal structures and patterns are just some gimmick, or if they're actually important. The "restless feet" gimmick here solves neither of these conundrums, though I think it does argue in the affirmative. Or at least it enhances the fiction that this writing is both discernable and genuine. Ultimately, the feet respond, merely, but I do think they help.)

This dropdown will either have a verry summarized version of the origin piece, or will have the origin piece in full but without the blue stage directions. I'm just not sure how much unnecessary work is involved for a reader trying to encounter the blue and black version on this website. It's a little dense, sure, but I also think the formatting and color would need to be more inviting if it were included here. It's just hard to read this way, so below this are formatting tests.