I write by hand before I open my laptop. This is less noble than it sounds. The page may hold the beginning of an essay, a sentence I will later cross out, a note to buy coriander or toothpaste, or to call Mummy. A notebook does not care about hierarchy. It takes the thought and the shopping list in the order they arrive.
For years, I wanted little to do with AI, especially in writing. I had spent decades developing judgment and taste through creative direction, branding, and leadership. Language carries memory, geography, humour and all the irregularities through which one person becomes recognisable to another. A machine’s polished approximation of human expression felt absurd and depressing. Psychologists call this cognitive offloading: placing part of our mental burden outside the brain. A shopping list, calendar or map does it. AI can remember and arrange on a scale that my notebook cannot. The question is what I am willing to hand over. Repetition is easy to surrender. I am far more cautious with memory, judgment and language. For older women, the bargain is different.
An International Labour Organization analysis across 84 countries found that 29% of female-dominated occupations (secretarial, administrative, accounting support roles) were exposed to generative AI, compared with 16% of male-dominated occupations (construction and many manual trades).
