This weekend during the Netherlands-Sweden I met someone who was very similar to ChatGPT in that she guzzled huge amounts of fluid and energy and then only came out with averages. She said things like that life is not a competition but a game where no one gets the setup but where you have to hang the streamers yourself. I listened with fascination, not so much because of the statements as because of the confidence with which they were made. And also because, while talking, she had pushed me and my brother further and further into a corner.
“It’s the drink,” he whispered when our conversation partner became distracted by a goal. “I know her, she is normally very shy.”
Ah, so it was due to alcohol, that ancient portal to self.
“I’m thirsty,” my brother said as she turned her attention back to us, and before I could scream to join him, he had disappeared, leaving me exposed to the barrage of generalities on my own. As she continued to chatter, in addition to annoyance and helplessness, I suddenly realized that if this woman was indeed so shy by nature, perhaps she had never really learned to have a conversation. And so she only dared to speak when there were training wheels made of beer.
So it was due to alcohol, that ancient portal to self
Meanwhile, she talked incessantly about her new pergola, but what once seemed self-centered was now a display of unintentional incompetence. She also just wanted contact.
“Wood is complicated,” she said of that aforementioned pergola. “It cannot be tamed, haha, just like a human being! It is as big a mystery as meat!”
Pats, she surprised me there.
I wondered what she would remember from this evening tomorrow. I might be nothing more than a spot, a hole into which she had poured out without hindrance all that she usually kept for herself. Maybe she wouldn’t be able to remember me completely, but she would still remember that someone once didn’t walk away, or gave others funny looks while she continued to rattle on.
“Wow, I talk a lot,” she said.
“No big deal,” I said. “Continue.”
And then there was that old voice, like, why are you pretending to be a messiah? You’re only listening to feel better about yourself. I offered her to go get a spa red and then get some air.
“Don’t leave,” she said as I walked to the bar. “Don’t leave.”
