Date: 7/29/2022
By Aler
I am going for a swim in a frozen lake. I start to walk out, but there is a chain link fence. I climb over. My feet are cold and wet, but I’m otherwise fine. I am driving a white car (I cannot drive in real life). There is one more row of seats between the drivers seat and the steering wheel, but I manage. I drive to a hotel, looking for a towel or socks. On the 7th floor is a service desk. At the seventh floor, a large area is set up fir guests to borrow items of clothing or toys, as long as they bring them back the next day. I could take a pair of warm socks, but I’m not a hotel guest. I decide to be honest and buy a pair of thinner socks instead. I pay at a bar. One sock has a large hole in the toes. I need to prepare for an English class I’ve been assigned to teach. I have never taught this class before and never took an English class, and I’m completely unprepared. I realize that I should have had class three times per week, but often forget. My students must be showing up to an empty room. I read through a chapter to try to make a lesson plan. There is a sentence that can be read in two different ways depending on the context. I liken this to quantum mechanics, where something can be in two states in superposition and not collapse until observed. I try to explain the wave function collapse algorithm in procedural generation using tiles for land, sea and beach. It’s not a bad lecture. At the classroom, my students are preparing for a dramatic presentation. I didn’t remember assigning this to them, and realize I can’t teach. I stand up at the front of the class and announce that I am resigning effective at the end of the class. I am very sorry for the hardship I caused them through my absence. My students are dressed in black, semi formal. They have dark makeup across the eyes, like a mask. It’s rough, drippy or spattered. It’s a good look. A woman starts with a presentation of percussion (taps and beats), generated using the wave function collapse algorithm. This is followed by the reading of poetry, displayed on a big screen. I sit in the audience, watching. I am upset that I let me students down, but impressed at how much they accomplished.