Fathers and Daughters: In their A.I. Era
Dear Old Drew imagines AI writing letters to a TV daughter that get her into the wrong Notre Dame, promise a Chincoteague pony that sends her to mom who's doing Pilates and slimming down her ...
By Drew Gallagher
HUMORIST
Mail Drew
After a recent surgery, I was provided with the opportunity to watch ample television while trying to get the hospital bed as comfortable as the original 1958 patent intended.
Most of the commercials on the sports channels I was watching featured men who were unable to achieve erections which attractive women with ample cleavage assured me was only a pill away. The other commercials were about itchy skin and rashes which I might not have had at the time but after a week in a hospital bed seemed like a growing possibility.
In short, I might not be a complete human being but pharmaceutical companies were waiting by their phones to help me live my best life. Thank you, Big Pharma!
Into this landscape of physical inadequacy, a company named Gemini launched a commercial about a plucky young girl who wants to be an Olympic sprinter and seemingly idolized a sprinter at the Olympics. I say seemingly because we never hear from the plucky young girl. It is only through the lens of her doting father that we are provided an outline about his daughter and her interests which the father believes are to write a letter to her Olympic idol.
The daughter never tells us if she wants to write such a letter (one could argue, generously, that she was training and did not have time to put pen to paper—or one could argue, less generously and realistically, she was on her phone), but dear old Dad thought the letter was a great idea and was going to enlist Gemini’s A.I. system to help him/her write the perfect letter.
I think I was supposed to feel warm and fuzzy, but my takeaway was that incessant itching and an inability to achieve an erection seemed far preferable than having A.I. write a letter on behalf of my disinterested daughter.
Now, I certainly don’t know what commercial Dad’s situation might be (Gemini did not provide any helpful background), but I did start to consider the precedent this is setting for future correspondence on behalf of the daughter. There are times, one would assume, that actually getting the daughter’s input into the substance of a letter might prove useful if not entirely necessary, but Dad created this world and A.I. responded in kind.
Dear Gemini A.I.:
Well, that did not go well! The sprinter never sent my daughter a letter, and I think it turned her completely off running even though she had no idea that she had sent a letter to her Olympic sprinter or that she had never gotten a response from her idol.
My daughter and I don’t talk as much now because I only have joint custody, and she now hates running. I try to lead her back to running when I can by reminding her that her mother’s butt didn’t get that big on its own, and more people die on electric scooters than they do running hundred-yard sprints at the local football field, but she just gets on social media and tells her friends that I suck.
So I need to make this up to her. Could you please draft me a letter to Santa Claus, from my daughter of course, and ask for something that most 11-year- old girls dream of for Christmas?
Thank you!
Dear Old Dad
Dear Gemini A.I.:
What the f**k? This time you get a response to your letter and it’s Santa promising my daughter a Chincoteague pony! She’s over the moon, but the HOA President laughed when I asked if I could stable a pony in my eighth of an acre backyard. Hell, we can’t even stain our fence without Board approval, so I’m not going to be able to build a stable even if it matches my shed.
This is not going to end well. My daughter is already talking about spending more time with her mother and Gail’s new boyfriend who lives on a farm where they raise free range chickens and probably have enough room for a Chincoteague pony. My daughter also says that her mother has been doing Pilates and her butt is now half the size of my beer gut.
You know that Artificial Intelligence could be taken to mean “made up intelligence”, right? As in dumb.
Thank you for nothing!
Dear Old Dad
Dear Gemini A.I.:
Been a few years, but my daughter has now decided she wants to go to college and not just any college—Notre Dame. My great grandmother’s family came from County Sligo so feel free to use O’Faolin for my daughter’s signature line even if it’s not her actual last name and even if my daughter has no idea that she’s 1/16th Irish. Notre Dame requires a letter (well, they call it an essay but those are pretty much the same thing) where my daughter talks about herself and what trials have brought her to this point in her life and how she thinks the Notre Dame experience can help her achieve the goals she has in life. I figure at this point you know her pretty well—failed track star who never got to meet her idol, comes from a broken home with a mother who still has a fat ass (IMHO she should get that Pilates money back), and was never able to have a Chincoteague pony growing up in suburbia.
Appreciate the help. Go Irish!
Dear Old Dad
Dear Gemini A.I.:
We’re done!
Sure, my daughter was thrilled to get her acceptance letter, but it’s the wrong Notre Dame! Who even knew there was a Notre Dame college in Baltimore? They don’t even have a football team! Their mascot is a gator not a fighting Irishmen. Do they even have gators in the Inner Harbor? I don’t remember that part of the National Anthem when they talk about the rocket's red glare and the gator's menacing stare. You suck and you’ve ruined my daughter’s life. If I’m ever asked for a letter of recommendation on Gemini A.I. I’m going to use another A.I. company to absolutely trash you guys.
Dear Old Dad
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