I have been working inside a frame I never built, never chose and never once stood back far enough to actually see,
I have been working inside a frame, filling it in with full effort and calling this effort ambition when the frame itself was the first thing I should have questioned,
I have been working inside a frame that someone handed me long before I understood the difference between a starting point and a limitation,
How much of what I have made was shaped by what I believed was possible inside this particular structure and how little of it came from the part of me that had no support at all,
I have been working inside a frame and every time I pressed against the edge I called it the boundary of my talents rather than the boundary of the mold I was still holding on to...
The rule I learned so early I cannot find the beginning of it sits somewhere between instinct and clear instruction,
The rule I learned so early still sounds like my own voice when it speaks and that is the most disorienting part of trying to examine it,
The rule I learned so early has been deciding which ideas were worth pursuing and which ones got too loud,
If I traced this rule all the way back to where it received me, would I still want to carry it or would I leave it in that smaller room where it was born,
The rule I learned so early has been more loyal to the version of me that needed protecting than to the version of me that is standing here trying to make something real...
I have been aiming for average without knowing it because that average was already built into the tools I chose before,
I have been aiming for average and calling the result consistent without ever asking whether consistent was the same as being truly alive,
I have been aiming for average by beginning every new thing with the vocabulary of the last thing, assuming the learning is still applied,
When did fitting in become the quiet goal underneath the louder and more presentable goal to everyone who asked,
I have been aiming for average and then wondering why the work that moves me most in other people feels like it lives in a world I keep traveling toward but never truly arriving...
The shape I keep making is not wrong exactly but it is so recognizable that even I stop seeing it before it is finished,
The shape I keep making has become a kind of my signature and I am no longer certain whether every influence was mine,
The shape I keep making starts from the same place every single time because starting from somewhere unfamiliar still carries a cost to be willing,
What would this look like if I started not from what I know how to make but from what I cannot yet explain and do not yet have a name for,
The shape I keep making is the most honest evidence I have stopped asking and began believing in the form I’m still not sure of any evidence…
Watchwords:
A frame I never built but kept filling in,
Sounds like my own voice when it speaks,
The average was built into the tools first,
Consistent was not the same thing as alive,
Started from what I cannot yet name...
Here is Tikatarot, who dares you to answer the question, “Who am I?”..
As and will always be reminding you to dream:
