Last night (well, the night before by now) I had another dream about a spider. This spider was enormous and had a prehistoric underside. It had taken up residence in my bed. IN MY BED. In the dream I was not at all pleased with the situation and went so far as to do the following: complain to anyone who would listen, mostly strangers. Despite the horrible anxiety this dream gave me, I had no desire to get up when I had to this morning.

Today (well, yesterday by now) in my Performance Studies class, we discussed Dadaism. Some of my students were very frustrated by this particular movement, but it’s one of my favorites. We had a great conversation.

“Dada is Nothing. Order = disorder; ego = non-ego; affirmation = negation: the supreme radiations of an absolute art. Absolute in the purity of a cosmic, ordered chaos, eternal in the globule of a second without duration, without breath without control…I say unto you: there is no beginning and we do not tremble, we are not sentimental. We are a furious wind, tearing the dirty linen of clouds and prayers, preparing the great spectacle of disaster, fire, decomposition. We will put an end to mourning and replace tears by sirens screeching from one continent to the other.” – Tristan Tzara, Dada Manifesto 1918

Nothing. What is nothing? Is nothing something? Is it something to feel nothing? Is it nothing to feel something? If I get rid of any physical trace of you will you become nothing, or will you still be something?

After class, I was sifting through my email, looking for something, and came across a fabulous tool I had completely forgotten about: the Random Paragraph Generator. I can’t believe I forgot about the Random Paragraph Generator, y’all! I found an entire email of paragraphs I generated back in 2008 using this brilliant contrivance. They are very Dada. I combined them, tweaked them, edited them: they are now less Dada (but still a little Dada). Then I wrote something else, something systematic, in response to my random generation. You can read all of it. You know. If you want.

Here:

I sicken above you: the tiger parades, escapes the past, the last mumble. The tiger rages through you, an interesting alternative: a garbled love, the cat lowers next to the piano. You rocket, worry: bypass the crush, unite behind the landscape, inside tomorrow. I seed the yearly torture within each scratch. The monster folds you, but I frighten you: I am more than a monster. You command a stunning disclaimer against the tiny ideology. You defend me under the gun, assault, pound down upon a civil time, confess. I indulge, refute, blink before the hand. I double as you, a ghost.

We were lying on our stomachs on the floor and you asked me why I was crying. You were worried that I was sad, begged me not to cry, not to be sad. “Please don’t be sad, don’t be sad, don’t be sad.” I lied, told you I wasn’t sad, that I didn’t realize I was crying. But I saw, in a flash, the future, knew that this would happen. Saw that I would willingly walk into this, knowing. If I get rid of any physical trace of you will you become nothing, or will you still be something?

Also, this: 

This was one of my favorite films as a kid, but I don’t remember how The Nothing is defeated. I know that The Nothing is a problem, that the people of Fantasia are not fans of The Nothing, but I can’t remember how the situation is resolved. Clearly I need to re-familiarize myself with this movie. Let me if you want to come over and watch it. I have popcorn.