I chose thirteen planets—objects orbiting the Sun, of various sizes, shapes, and structures, some nearer and some further: to the center and to the conventional concept of a planet. The choice was not easy. I was looking for atypical planets, I was looking for exceptional ones, I was searching according to the initial letters and numbers of their ordinal names forming a scale, I searched according to mythical names, their letters, and their meanings. Here is the list: Quaoar (50000), Antiope (90), Bennu (101955), Semiramis (584), Ceres (1), Doris (48), Toutatis (4179), Euphrosyne (31), Flora (8), Makemake (136472), Gonggong (225088), Hela (699), Varuna (20000).

Having chosen, for a long time I did not know what to do next. I felt like the work was done, and at the same time, I obviously hadn’t actually done anything much yet. I didn’t know how to start writing; whether to create a catalog of techniques, positions, a scale of difficulty levels, etc. I was going around in circles, in place. Finally, I decided to start from the end. To write the most difficult piece in the collection first, the point of convergence of all these potential lines of progression, and then gradually reduce everything. I have the first piece, which is actually the last, and I'm moving forward, that is actually backward.

By the way, a thought: often the path forward is only seemingly a path of progress and expansion but is actually a path of simplification and reduction. The path forward is a path toward zero. However, the optimum is not zero but a point near it. A race towards the edge of the abyss. Whoever doesn't chicken out and stops closer to it, wins.