I
DIDN’T SAY THAT
My word recognition program refuses to recognize me. I keep telling it my name is Whit but always it calls me ‘with.’ Sure it boasts a big bag of words but it scatters their phonetic sounds like Johnny Appleseed on a broadcasting mission. It even knows the word ‘grammar’ but has no idea of its meaning, let alone its context. It joins words with unscrupulous abandon. It pledges allegiance to no one or no concept. For example take the pledge of allegiance.
Pledge allegiance to the flagging United
States of America into the puppets for which stands one nation ignited flirting
justice for all.
For me
this poses a dilemma. I use my word recognition program because I have
Parkinson’s and I am losing my ability to type. But what I say is not what
shows up on the screen. Am I responsible for this? What if Homeland Security gets hold of my hard drive?
Nothing is
sacred. It even annihilates the Ten Commandments rendering ‘Thou shalt not
commit adultery’ into ‘Michelle recommended only.’ But then refuses to give me
her phone number.
And
poetry? William Wordsmith’s “Daffodils” become Data Bills while Tennyson's
“Light Brigade” charges “Happily happily happily onward.” And not even a
sadistic bonsai artist could twist Joyce Kilmer's “Trees” in such an unseen
manner:
I think that I shall never see
Up one lovely as a tree
A tree is hungry mouth is pressed
Against your sweet flowering breast
A tree that lets it go all day
And left her leafy arms to pray
The tree that may in summer where
Vannesa Robbins in her hair
Bond is blossoming snow inflamed
Linda Bentley lives with rain
Paul Miller made fools like me
But only God can make a tree
I haven’t
a clue who Vannesa Robbins, Linda Bentley or Paul Miller might be other than
prodigy of computer codes breeding unchecked in some programmer’s basement.
It’s certainly not Julie Andrews who although perfectly enunciates, would only
have her words slaughtered through this technological advancement. So what
chance do people with foreign accents
and speech impediments have? Imagine a retreaded My Fair Lady? Eliza Doolittle would have smoke streaming from the
computer’s portals, hurricanes would blow Spain’s rain from here to breakfast
until Professor Higgins would at last address the screen with a cricket bat
shortly before losing it altogether going on a random killing spree.
Yet some days the program promises hope. Just last week
it almost dictated a letter perfectly... until the end. I signed off,
‘Sincerely, Whit.’
Only
it didn't call me Whit. As usual, it called me “with”.
So I said,
‘I said Whit!”
And it
displayed, “I said With.”
I yelled:
“I said, Whit, dammit!”
“I said
with dammit,” it replied.
“Whit Whit
Whit!” I screamed.
“With with
with,” read the screen.
Words, I
thought hyperventilating. They are only words. I needed to relax. Calm down. Go
read. I picked up Alice in Wonderland.