We are all cyborgs now

We can't escape technology, but we can fuck with it.

You’ll see a paywall on this essay earlier than usual because this essay explores some intimate family stuff. For the month of July, however, I’m running a sale on annual paid subscriptions in light of *gestures to fascist America*. Supporting artists and independent media is so very crucial right now, and on a more personal level, paid subs keep my work and my family going. I’m so grateful to every reader here.

A few weeks ago, I got up at 4am to drive my mother to a hospital, where she had a wire implanted on the left side of her brain. Two weeks later, she had another wire implanted on the right side of her brain, along with a battery-operated device that will stimulate the nonhuman parts that now live in her brain, hopefully putting an end to the essential tremors she’s struggled with for decades, which made it hard for her to bring a full cup of coffee to her lips, without losing the drink to her lap.

At least, I think that’s the how it all works. I’ve poured over Google and the incomplete information my mother forwarded me prior to the surgery in the form of emails, texts, videos of doctors with skull models, and, once, a video of herself, reading paper handouts about care and surgery prep into her phone’s camera. But this is one of those rare cases where the subject is in fact brain surgery. I still find it all a bit hard to understand.