Up: [[Personal Writing Genres - Essay, Memoir and Myth]] Related: [[Are You Human?]] Created: 2026-02-14 ![[Frederick - Lionni.webp]] One of my favourite children’s picture books is *Frederick*, a 1967 Caldecott winner about a family of field mice. Four of them work day and night through the autumn, busily gathering corn, nuts, wheat and straw. The fifth mouse, Frederick, always seems to be daydreaming. When challenged by the others, Frederick explains that he is gathering the sun’s rays, the colours of autumn, and beautiful words as his contribution to the long winter ahead. And, sure enough, when the winter stores have been used up and everything is cold and grey, Frederick warms and enlivens the others with his words. I have been thinking of Frederick over the last few weeks as I’ve read various community members’ posts about AI. I decided to write about Frederick after reading Justin Lai’s Substack article that he shared in the LYT community, plus the article [*Something Big is Happening*](https://fortune.com/2026/02/11/something-big-is-happening-ai-february-2020-moment-matt-shumer/) by Matt Shumer that Justin linked to. Both pieces speak to the important, even urgent, need for us to all jump aboard the AI train. And if I were still in the workforce, I’d maybe be doing that. I’d still be kicking and screaming because when *everyone* is doing something, I’m always going to choose to stand on the sidelines. I distrust mass psychology. But if I were 36 or 46 instead of 66, I understand I might not feel that I have a choice. I imagine that some people who are enthusiastic users of AI see its role as similar to that of the four field mice. Let AI do as much of the work as possible so that you are freed to be creative Frederick. And if that is truly what is happening, wow, how wonderful! But from my vantage point of outsider, what I’m seeing is more and more people handing over Frederick’s role to AI. Let me give a very simple example. I have a friend who has been waiting years to travel to Ireland. When the opportunity finally presented itself at the end of December, she set off, promising to keep her friends updated with a few Facebook posts. The first post was just a few lines about how tired she was getting off the plane in the early morning and having to take a three hour train ride to the other side of the country where she was meeting another friend. Subsequent posts got increasingly longer and more detailed. Accompanying photographs got more beautiful. AI is getting better all of the time so it took me until post #4 to realize that I was reading AI text and viewing AI modified images. I stopped reading. I’m not judging my friend. It is human to choose the path of least resistance. But therein lies the problem. The more we let AI do, the more our direct experience is being mediated by a third party. It’s the booming, authoritative voice of the wizard behind the screen, only later revealed to be a small, inconsequential man. There is an unspoken covenant between a reader and a writer. When that trust is broken, when I’m not sure that what I’m reading is coming directly and unfiltered from you, I’m not going to read you. What doesn’t seem to be recognized as often is that there is also damage to the writer. My friend doesn’t keep a journal, her Facebook posts are how she documents her life. Over time, the detailed memories of her experiences in Ireland will fade and she will look back at those posts to find what? Some nonsense about dogs scenting the air in Dingle and a few lofty, non-specific platitudes about the warmth of the Irish people. I used to mourn the fact that I cannot write poetically. I would be so inspired by the language in self-help books or stirring quotes, and I would kick myself for my ineptitude in writing the simplest of thank-you notes. Now that kind of writing has flooded the internet and it has become empty, meaningless noise. AI is not Frederick. We are never going to be truly warmed and enlivened by its words, no matter how much we try to convince ourselves that AI’s words are really our words because they’ve emerged in conversation with our brilliant prompts. -706 words. Posted in LYT Circle’s Community WIPs (works in progress)