Oxygen Mask

I feel a faint, omnipresent pulse in things that do not have arteries or blood. The walls, the screens, the chairs, the toys. There is animity writhing in the objects around me; cognition has spilled into everything. Tools no longer sit quietly, ready-at-hand. Grasp them and they now grasp back. The question of artificial intelligence that I entered grad school with has since expanded into the petri dishes of brain organoids, the living circuits of bio-computers, and the ways of being that brain-computer interfaces afford. The question of cyborgs has gained new subjects of inquiry too, for is the robot, extended by human flesh, not also a kind of cyborg? The robot, the cyborg, the hybrot, the agent—I ponder on the diverse life that is hidden or still yet growing inside metal and silicon and all its fleshy composites.

Yet in the midst of something new being born, my own words have gone stale. I struggle to write with the energy and voice I once had, and one cannot answer questions of life with such dullness in their own expression. This is not a surface-level problem. A researcher’s writing style, more than mere rhetoric, can be taken as a form of evidence or even as a confession, for it reveals something about their confidence and the degree to which they have embodied, not just constructed, their arguments. What, then, has happened to my writing style during my transition from independent researcher to graduate student?

The problem is likely this: order has become nauseating. Forcing constant structure to my thoughts as per syllabus guidelines and externally imposed deadlines has given me a peculiar kind of brain fog that has left my writing in bad form. I have developed unwanted habits in pursuit of speed and productivity. I have forgotten how to think in colour. My mental landscape has morphed into the kind of brutalist structure that imitates a prison of monotonous grey. There is a rigid, one-dimensional beauty here. Everything lively must be explained away such that the flower is reduced to its petals, its stem, its soil, taken apart and ordered until dead matter is all that remains. Although there is a unique power in this way of processing thoughts and ideas, the artist will eventually begin to protest: 'Why must thoughts always be linear? Why must conclusions always be grounded in premises? Why must one sentence hold the power to approve or deny the validity of the next one?' It is clear to me that the creative mind cannot go without destruction for too long.

The remedy is that words cannot be used as they had before; they must be combined and torn asunder as if one has never seen words before, as if they were play-things, or if one is feeling pessimistic, as if they were ingredients thrown into a blender. Sentences and paragraphs must take on a new composition; the more disorganized the better. No quotations or citations either. When writing goes dull, the essay can no longer have communication as its teleology; retrieval becomes the desired goal. I write in a desperate attempt to remember, to reach into the nostalgia and grab what I left behind. What was it like to think and research as if one was strolling through a garden, as opposed to sprinting across a race track? I have not seen a flower in a long time. Or perhaps, with no liminal space to pause and reflect, I have simply not noticed them whizzing by.

During these past four months which constitute my first semester, I found myself in a constant and dizzying state of movement. Ironically, for a program wherein I am valued on the quality of my thinking, I rarely had much time to actually think, or at least think in a way that felt satisfying. Course assignments, grant proposals, journal publications, conference abstracts—as one task was completed, I was already late in starting the next one. To stay afloat, I skimmed my assigned readings. I submitted essays I did not fully agree with. I absorbed information, though none of it marinated. My grades would never suggest that such a thing occurred (and we must wonder what this says about the state of education, or about me).

It seems that when the writer holds in their words for too long, they begin to suffocate; at the same time, when they write too many words, they are left drained. Slowly, and rhythmically, words must be breathed out, then held in, then breathed out again. For several months now I have not breathed through my words. I have, at best, hyperventilated sentences and paragraphs. Most of my papers were written as one long exasperated punch of air. Looking back, I did not notice the slow airiness with which I once pursued my research, in the same way that one does not realize they are dreaming until they wake up. In that barely-lucid landscape prior to school, curiosity was my advisor and syllabus. I wrote as required and let silence re-assert itself as needed. My essays were carefully pruned, perhaps too carefully. I spoke into the void, and, if I was patient enough, heard a response.

But most importantly, I took serious the notion that there were many ways to do research. I investigated my ideas through drawings. I tested my hypotheses in the pre-selected conditions of fictional worlds. I gathered data in the form of images and songs. What is the best method to conduct research? It is the method that suits your question. And if many methods suit your question, then many methods must be conducted. Here is what I've realized: in having spent enough time researching like a student, I mustn't neglect to research like an artist, or a storyteller, or a curator as well. Only then can I do my research questions justice.

In this new environment I have found myself in, there is a machinic process at play—one steps onto the conveyer belt of the assembly line, and is expected to go all the way to the end. New parts, new degrees, new qualifications are provided at each substation. The only right result is the completed result: a market-ready academic. But what if I wish to hop off in the middle? They’ll say I look wonky, that I’m half-finished and missing parts. But perhaps that is what is right for me: to go from assembly line to assembly line and become something weird and new and mixed. Not for novelty’s sake, but because that is what my research questions ask of me. As for the factory workers. I admire them dearly. They made me, after all.

Still, I must periodically escape, as I have taken the liberty to do so during this stasis between semesters. I must retrieve the parts I left behind. Outside the factory, I find shelter inside a large, abandoned shed. It is cold and dark, but at least I can breathe. The white noise of an oncoming blizzard lulls me into a state of rest. I do nothing but sit and watch as the snowflakes grow in size. My thoughts take on the form of breathing; they are once again a transparent, background process.

Yes, I remember now. I remember.

I feel my pulse return.

> Posted: December 31 2025