The real benefit to writing things down is the ability to forget about something without also losing it. Then you can decide later if it's important enough to remember.

The pen will never be able to move fast enough to write down every word discovered in the space of memory. Some things have been lost forever, other things will perhaps be remembered again, and still other things have been lost and found and lost again. There is no way to be sure of any this.

Memory is quite central for me. Part of it is that I like the actual texture of writing through memory,.

In the Land of Memory the time is always Now.
In the Kingdom of Ago, the clocks tick... but their hands never move.
There is an Unfound Door
(O lost)
and memory is the key which opens it.

I had seven minutes permanently burned out of my memory (when the van hit). I did get one back of the guy coming over the hill heading toward me. It's like a coral islet in the sea. ... I have no idea if (the story) is any good, but what the h--l, I like it.

I'm thinking about past events. I'm interested in recall, exact recall, of what was said, who said it and to whom. I want to know the truth, undistorted by time and revision and wishes and regrets.