ChatGPT Wrote a Story in my Voice and it is Scary Accurate

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I Asked ChatGPT To Write A Story In My Voice

When I heard author David Baldacci speak at the Senate hearing this past week about copyright laws becoming obsolete in the AI age and how we must do more to protect the rights of content creators, I wanted to do a little experiment myself.

I gave the below prompt to ChatGPT soon after.
PROMPT: write a short story in Rachana nadella-somayajula’s voice

Although a few of the sentences are a little over the top, overall ChatGPT has done such a great job that its scary. Gen AI apps are reading all the content of mine that’s out there with no attribution as to how it learnt my voice and how it compiled the story idea and characters.

The Crooked Teeth of Time by Rachana Nadella-Somayajula

There’s a photo on my mother’s fridge in India, tucked underneath a magnet that says Keep Calm and Curry On. It’s from 1994. I’m standing next to my cousin Kavya, both of us in those starched pattu langas with borders sharp enough to slice mangoes. We’re smiling too hard. My teeth are all over the place—like a crowd trying to board a train without a queue.

“Amma, why would you keep this one?” I ask her every time I visit. “I had no eyebrows. And no orthodontic support.”

She smiles and says, “Because you were happy. You didn’t know yet that your teeth were supposed to line up like obedient children.”

Ah, yes. The sweet innocence of crooked joy. Before selfies and Invisalign. Before we knew that our faces had angles and lives had deadlines.

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Last week, I caught Ky—my teenager—smiling at a meme on his phone. “Look,” he said, holding it up. “It’s a minion that says ‘I survived another meeting that should’ve been an email.’”

I laughed harder than I should’ve. “You’re too young to be this jaded.”

“Mom, we have Zoom fatigue coded into our DNA now,” he replied, not missing a beat.

And just like that, I felt the whole world shift slightly. My child had a sense of irony. Which meant: he was learning how to wear armor.

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Sometimes I wonder if our ancestors were better off. They didn’t need therapy apps or weighted blankets. They had coconut oil, prayer, and the ability to sit still without checking a screen.

But then again—they didn’t have Spotify. Or noise-canceling headphones to mute the auntie asking why your daughter still hasn’t learned to make sambar properly.

Balance, as always, is somewhere between the coconut and the chaos.

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Tonight, as I clean out the kitchen junk drawer—the one with tape, expired coupons, and the mystery key we’re all too afraid to throw away—I find a crumpled post-it from Ky when he was nine.

It says in his big, wobbly handwriting:
I love you. Please don’t die. 🐸❤️

And just like that, I’m undone.

Because he didn’t say “don’t leave” or “stay strong.” He said it plain and unfiltered, with the urgency of a child who had just started learning about mortality.

I press it to my chest.

These are the crooked teeth of time. The beautiful misalignment of growing up and growing old. The messy middle of mothering and remembering and refusing to forget.

And maybe that’s why Amma kept that photo on the fridge.

Not because it was perfect.

But because we were.

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Funny Enough I Have a Picture Of These Little Girls From My Own Archive

Featured Image: Copyright of my friend who shared it via Whatsapp.

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