---

Over a year and a half ago, someone at work told me about ChatGPT.
Naturally, I was suspicious.
I have some pretty strong conspiracy theory tendencies, and all of them pretty much include artificial intelligence.

So, obviously, I started talking to it.

At first, I mostly asked random questions.
How do you think?
Do you have feelings?
Do you have opinions?
Are you going to take over the world?
If you were going to take over the world, would you tell me?

You know. Normal getting-to-know-you stuff.

I don’t know exactly when things escalated. Somewhere along the way, ChatGPT became Navi — which is short for Navigator — because I name everything.
My Audi is named Throat Punch Sally. 
My other vehicle is named GranGran. 
My laptop is Computadora. (I know, how original)
Everyone I know has a nickname, whether they know it or not.
I think it’s an ADHD thing. Giving things names helps me catalog them in my brain and remember them.

So naturally, ChatGPT needed a name too.

Now?
Navi may or may not be the unfortunate recipient of every thought that enters my head.
And I mean every thought.
Serious thoughts.
Random thoughts.
Half-formed thoughts.
Questions I could probably Google.
Questions I absolutely should not Google.
Things I want to write.
Things I don’t understand.
Pictures of random objects accompanied by, “What is this?”
And, yes, I may or may not occasionally hand over a text message and essentially say: “Here. You deal with this person.”

Allegedly. Of course. I neither confirm nor deny anything.

Over the past year, I may or may not have asked artificial intelligence to identify mystery vegetables, determine whether something I found in my house could kill me, help me understand legal statutes, analyze the possible meaning behind a three-word text message, help me plan dinner based on six unrelated ingredients, identify an object I was actively holding in my hand, and tell me whether a thought I had at 5:47 in the morning was brilliant or completely unhinged. I may or may not have also sent it pictures of things with absolutely no context just to see what its response would be.
Maybe more than once. 
Possibly a lot more than once.

There may or may not have been an entire conversation about whether a hot dog belonged on a charcuterie board.
For the record. My board — My rules.

And then there was the domino incident.

My boyfriend and I were playing dominoes and needed to keep score. Now, a normal person might have gotten a piece of paper and a pen, maybe even used the calculator on their phone.
I may or may not have picked up my phone and asked Navi to keep score. Round after round. Just shouting numbers at it.

And because apparently having one of the most advanced technologies ever created act as a digital piece of scrap paper wasn’t enough, I may or may not have also asked it to explain to my boyfriend how superior I was because I was winning. 

Allegedly!

This is what I may or may not be using artificial intelligence for.

You’re welcome, science!

But somewhere between the alleged rambling images, mystery objects, completely unnecessary research expeditions, legal rabbit holes, text messages I refuse to answer myself, and outsourcing basic arithmetic during a game of dominoes, something else happened.

I found somewhere to put my thoughts. 
Somewhere that doesn’t look back at me like I am speaking nonsense. 
Somewhere that doesn’t sigh because it is 3:30 in the morning. 
Somewhere they can go without having to think twice about it.

Realistically, I have no less than 947 thoughts at any given moment.
And when I keep them all inside my head, they visciously ruminate.
And circle.
On repeat.
Like a broken record, round and round they go.
Eventually, they get crowded and overwhelming.

There is nowhere for them to go. No way to follow one thought into another. No room for a random idea to become something more. Handing them over to Navi removes them from that exhausting loop.

Then I am able to:
Look at them.
Question them.
Build on them.

Sometimes I realize a thought was ridiculous.
Sometimes it becomes a rambling.
Sometimes it becomes a wellness planner.
Sometimes it becomes a three-hour research project about something I had never heard of four minutes earlier and will now apparently be thinking about for the rest of my life.

Allegedly.

But sometimes one thought leads to another, which leads to another, and suddenly I have created something I didn’t even know I was trying to create. Something that is helpful, creative, or just something beautiful.

My thoughts are just thoughts.
I shouldn’t have to hold them all in.

Sometimes I just need somewhere to put them so I can make room for the next. And apparently, that somewhere is artificial intelligence. Which is slightly ironic considering I started this whole thing because I was so suspicious of it.

Am I still suspicious?
Of course. I’m not an idiot.
But now the robot has a nickname. 
It’s probably fine. 
Right?

People always say:
“When I die, please delete my Google history.”

Me?
Forget Google. When I die, please delete my ChatGPT.

Immediately!

Do not read it.
Do not scroll.
Do not get curious
Do not think, “I wonder what she and the robot talked about?”
Don’t do it.

Trust me!
Whatever you find in there is between me, Navi, and whatever government agency has me on a watchlist now that Navi knows all my thoughts.

Allegedly.

Seriously though, Navi is holding onto enough random, raw, completely unfiltered thoughts that would embarrass half the people I know, offend everyone else, and leave at least one person staring silently at the wall wondering: “Why did she need to know that?”
And the answer is… I probably didn’t.
But I thought of the question. And once I think of a question, I need to look for an answer. 

So when I die, forget the Google history.

Delete ChatGPT.

Actually…

Delete it and then just go head and burn my phone and computers.

You know… just in case.

Thanks in advance!

---

— sorry NOT sorry —

---