THE MACHINE
This project was a labor of love...that failed tremendously. The day I presented this started out as the best day of my life and ended as the worst. I find it difficult to describe what I went through, and am still not entirely sure if it was for the best, but the road leading up to it was fruitful, and yet still my own personal shortcomings were its undoing.
Coming up for my idea for the second project (the never happened) was a lot of random reading of material from various areas of study--yet, the one that struck me the most was a book called The Future of the Body by Michael Murphy. Primarily the focus was on that of human potential. I knew that this was an interest of mine, but had no idea in how to implement it as a project.
Then we saw Tetsuo (d: Shinya Tsukamoto, 1989).
Upon seeing this movie, ideas flooded me. I knew that fusing human material with metal was the future. All the reading about human potential, all the sleepless nights I spent overwhelmed by the sheer importance of what could possibly be, finally seemed to be coming to a head.
Thus was born The Machine. Beginning with a complex base of enzymes and proteins derived from synthetic human material, the components assembled themselves out of necessity to process the material into one of a hybrid.
In essence, this should've been Project 2, since that is when I discovered that this could actually (possibly) be performed. Yet, I became extremely frightened of the discovery; I went on a bender. Very unprofessional. Weeks went by, Project 2 was long-forgotten. When I woke up from the haze, I had a plan. I knew that this was the Building Block of the Future (™). Possiblities were endless.
Daunting as this all was, I knew that I must at least try to fulfill what I felt was my destiny.
After a lengthy compilation of materials, contruction of The Machine began.
Upon completion, a week of sleepless nights later, I was unsure of whether or not my skills were good enough and therefore concluded that I could only depend on it running once--which would have to be in class; for better or worse. I just couldn't risk it.
One other thing I feel necessary to mention is that in addition to the synthetic human enzyme/protein solution, and the complex Galvanthropromorphosizer ("a big word for the future" ™) is that it became imperative that actual human material be combined with the solution. Thus, slicing the palm of my hand and collecting a specimen during the presentation directly into the machine while it was running became the best, easiest, and now, I know, not the most logical option.
Needless to say, the presentation was the one and only time The Machine was to run, and fluids got so contaminated as to render the resulting product useless. Clearly, this was an error in design. Perhaps if I'd had any history with chemistry, this would have ended better, but it was not to be. Early on in the demonstration/first running of The Machine, gaskets began to blow and fluid to overflow. All was lost.
I could not believe it failed. All that meticulous planning was for naught. I mean, the formulas and designs could all be tweaked, but it won't be easy--and I discovered that the next step is not to be taken by me; too much of a personal toll was taken.
THE REAL STORY:
The majority of the above tale is true, the documentation, the research into molecular biology, Tetsuo changing my life, the interest in human potential based off of Michael Murphy's book. However, in actuality, I devised a complex plan that would be difficult to pull off--even more difficult considering my lack of performing anything ever. The plan was to present this Machine, as it were, as the first time it was to run...but things would go awry. There was supposed to be an alarm sounding while the lights were out for several seconds which just didn't happen, but whatever. It ended up adding more to the sense of failure that I was going for; yet at the time it felt like a failure of a failure.
In essence The Machine was a Rube Goldburg project but with water. Using vinyl tubing of various diameters, and carefully drilled holes, I connected random vessels collected at a multitude of restaurant supply and hardware stores. These things, along with a small water pump, and an air pump (for bubbles), and water dyed red, created the illusion of a working machine. There was silver paint on hand just in case The Machine was not as big of a monumental failure as it ended up being to be the "anthro-metallic" fusion, but that did not work out. A lot of things did not work out. It was as much of a failed presentation as I could have possibly imagined...but it many more ways than the obvious.
I pushed myself for this project much more than I've ever pushed myself for anything. I really wanted to do something different and see what I could actually accomplish. Apparently, I went too far and the result was an unaccessable presentation that no one gave a crap about. That hurt. But, I did learn something even if it wasn't what I wanted to learn: my personal limitations. And for that, I am grateful in a very bittersweet way.
