A high school student recently informed me, with the confidence of a man announcing the discovery of fire, that there was no possible way I had written a ten-page report without artificial intelligence.

I explained that he was mistaken, although I could see he was struggling with the concept. “Son,” I said, “I used to write ten-page reports the night before they were due, without reading the book, by hand, and in cursive.”

He looked at me as though I had just confessed to building the pyramids with a pinknife.

I went on to explain that we didn’t have computers, spell-checkers, internet research, or some electronic companion willing to manufacture a paragraph whenever we developed a thought. We had a pencil, an encyclopedia and dictionary, a deadline, and the terrible suspicion that the teacher might actually have read the assigned material.

If we needed ten pages, we wrote ten pages. If we ran out of information, we became remarkably creative. If we ran out of things to say, we enlarged our handwriting and discovered the tremendous academic value of generous margins.

I told him I still write my stories the same way, except nowadays I occasionally read the book. He shook his head.

The young fellow remains unconvinced.

He has artificial intelligence. I have artificial experience, questionable judgment, and sixty years of accumulated excuses.

And mine still works in cursive.