Hard to say when my brain became a robot. I noticed it during the pandemic. We, around the world, jumped out. I’m in the transition phase. My old leg, Ottobock C-Leg, started making humming noises. I can hear my feet Thinking, or whatever word we use when our machine parts get the job done.
I went to see a prosthetic specialist and he told me about a new device called Freedom Innovations Plié Knee. Of course they’ll name the knee after a damn ballet move.
Point of sale? It has a removable battery. I can have more batteries in my wallet. I won’t need to plug my face into the wall to charge anymore.
Why is the restorer enthusiastic? Maybe money. But he didn’t say that. They never said that. He told me I would love the new foot – they always say – and it would be lighter. Much lighter.
I weigh 100 pounds, so any extra weight from the machine matters.
The salesperson from Freedom Innovations gave me a t-shirt, a keychain.
On the next date, she didn’t know why Plié was going crazy. Why did I fall in my concrete driveway while receiving mail? Why does the leg not understand tilt and fall?
I imagine she assumed the fall was due to a “user problem.” That’s how prosthetic companies say, “It’s got to be your fault. Technology is fine.”
I leave home, in the early months of the pandemic, for foot appointments. I drove for errands—grocery store, gas station—but I didn’t get out of the car. My servant comes in. I sat in the car with the leg I didn’t like and my box of chronic pain medication. I was born with a birth defect from Agent Orange. I was an involuntary fighter in two wars: Vietnam and the War on Drugs. A war that has brought me pain; Another war threatens to keep me in it.
I watched people go in and out of the store. How easy they walk. This one rushes, fast, in and out. That person lost his mind, stopped wearing a mask, looked back at his truck.
Will I get used to the new leg? Does it just need practice? Why does everything hurt more?
For the first time time, switch legs, I’ve got a cyborg companion. I hired a robot Amy Gaeta be my assistant. She is a PhD student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. There are so many things that we don’t need to explain to each other because we both occupy the position of cyborg subjects. So we can ignore the bullshit about access, access, always access and theory.
I’m always watching Led by Yoshiko Dart: If you have money, hire disabled people.
It was only because I was chatting with another robot that I realized my brain was already a robot. Amy has autism. She studies drones, so our conversations often lead to war technology being an extension of the human brain, neurotypical and neurotypical modes of thinking, and why it’s so hard to keep a conversation going when one is in pain.
So I knew my body was a robot. I have known since 2010, when I published “Go to Cyborg” in The New York Times. It became even easier to explain my cyborg personality to anyone.
