I want to keep my knees

My mother went 75% as soon as she could, knees, arms, some vital organ upgrades and a black belt in karate all in one day at the salon…read more

I had the idea and then it floated away from me. Like it wasn’t here at all. Why does this happen? How does this happen?

The idea has simply slipped out of my head and I cannot get it back. This is what it’s like when you’re human. I sometimes wished I wasn’t. I should at least have a back up file installed-that makes you slightly less human. Why do I cling to the 100% idea? A little bit of extra memory here, some back up there, it becomes a slippery slope and before you know it your knees aren’t yours anymore.

That’s the thing, I should get me knees done. Its just -I like being fully human, I like being 100%. It’s weird I know. Who is 100% these days, why would you be? Think of the diseases I don’t have yet but could avoid. Of course, the ingestion of too much plastic will probably be the end of me if I don’t do some kind of restructure soon.

It is a slippery slope. I know it is. My friend Tessa, she was 100% until well into her 20s and then she hit 30 and now she’s only 40%. Forty per cent! She looks great but she’s hardly the bubbly person we all knew. She decided to get her emotions ‘toned down’, some sort of rational upgrade and now it’s just work, work, work all the time and sure she’s making money and the social media pics are great but she doesn’t enjoy it. Well its not that she doesn’t enjoy it, she doesn’t hate it either. She has no emotion attached to it whatsoever. Nice legs though, that’s what 40% does to you.

Nonetheless I am sitting here at a machine trying to write something and I can’t remember what that idea was. It was only half good anyway. Maybe just a small install, so I could play back memories on my computer. No it’s my knees, my knees!  I know I should get mechanical knees. I could get the ones that move your legs for you-they have a series of settings under the skin at the back and they can pace your running-just via your knees, it’s very clever, It monitors your heart rate and everything, it even sends positive messages to your brain as your running. It can play music too, well sort of, you hear it in your head as if it was playing. I have heard however that its playlist is very limited but I like the idea of just hearing the music in your head. It even has a karaoke setting that uses your actual voice based on hearing you speak. Its clever, but new knees and hi-tech ones at that, would take me down to about –well probably 96%. And then there’s the memory upgrade and that in itself- if you get enough can take you down to 85%. It might be worth it though, I mean you can’t post your whole life on social media. And it makes thinks like credit checks and job interviews easier as they can just download data.

Still I am reluctant. There are instances where people have dipped below say 65% and then the whole thing hasn’t worked and the software hasn’t interacted, interfaced, inter-whatever and it’s all gone terribly wrong. They then have to have the full upgrade or downgrade, depending on your point of view. -really the whole numbers thing is very confusing. When the full upgrade/downgrade happens, those people end up below 10% human. They are technically dead and they have to give up their name and they just become a number. All their photos and data is deleted as well and they technically stop existing for social media purposes. It’s awful.  Anything below 65% is more risky which is why Tessa at 40% is weird but brave. She is no longer in a position where she can make further decisions about her software. She needs specialist assistance to do it so that everyone is sure that it’s safe. She has no feelings about that either. It’s all very expensive.

I like the idea of my whole life, every second being preserved in a data chip but then I think, does anyone need to know how often I go to the toilet. Can it actually be done? Can everything I feel actually be recorded, everything I think? Can I lie to it? Can I get it to record something that I don’t feel?  Does it see what I see out of the corner of my eye or just what I see? I don’t know. Still I would like the knees.

I could get something really banal installed, like the ability to play piano, or to speak French. I am not at all sure where my reluctance comes from. My mother went 75% as soon as she could, knees, arms, some vital organ upgrades and a black belt in karate all in one day at the salon. She had all the memories of our childhood put onto a chip and gave it to us for Christmas. It was touching in a digital way. My sister then had those memories implanted in her head for safe keeping. My data chip from my Mum sits in a box by my bed. My mother doesn’t understand it. My sister sort of understands. She says I should join a support group. She worries there is something wrong with me. I want to tell her that 100% is normal. We are all born 100%. She says not anymore, 100% is optional even at birth.

I don’t know. I look at my knees. I love my knees. Sure they don’t work very well and they don’t put music in my head but their mine and I have had them for awhile. I’m not sure. I don’t know what to do.