On Memory-Keeping

How Time for Reflection Makes Me Less Beholden to Productivity

A half-dozen half-finished essays are looking accusingly at me in my document folder. They don't deserve to sit there neglected, and I'll be very proud of them eventually.

I don't have writer's block with any of them. Give me three solid hours, and I'd finish one off, ready to share with you. But setting aside that three solid hours are often hard to come by, there are other reasons why I haven't been writing the six projects that have had me most excited for the past few months.

I feel so much inward and outward pressure to be constantly productive. When I'm pressed for time (even if my deadlines are self-imposed), I want something to show at the end of each writing session. The temptation is always there to rush from the "new post" button to "publish." When even book recommendations feel hard to write, I know that I am valuing the end result of writing more than the process of writing, forgetting the reason I'm writing at all.

There are similar temptations in motherhood. Sometimes it feels easier to fold laundry than to play “Goldilocks and the Three Bears” one more time, even though playing with my kids will have a more lasting impact on our relationship than whether their clothes make it into their drawers at 10 am or 7 pm. In the moment, the empty laundry basket feels more satisfying.

This is such a nearsighted look at productivity. Most of the things that matter show very little progress at first, or none at all. An hour of listening to music is not wasted time, nor is a day spent visiting a friend. If I just want the quick high of finishing things, I might as well scrap the longer investments of time like learning how to bind books or teaching my daughter to read or writing anything worth writing.

One antidote to this avarice for productivity is memory-keeping.

To look forward in a healthy way, it helps to look back.

Memory-keeping is the blanket term I use for everything that helps me take stock of my life and relationships before rushing on to the next thing. Journaling, writing letters, sending thoughtful texts or emails, setting up phone calls just to chat, keeping a commonplace book, taking pictures and videos, scheduling visits, creating photo albums, writing letters in my kids' journals, re-reading old cards and jour als, and so on.

Memory-keeping is a way of consciously absorbing and retaining all I can, while knowing that it's impossible to really capture it all. Sometimes it's just the thought, when I hug my husband in the morning before he leaves for work, "Someday, God forbid, I might miss this, so let me not take it for granted now."

I take photos, and then I go back and look at them. It's so easy to archive our lives and most of our communication today automatically, but it matters more to me that I remember things than that there's a digital record on my Google account.

Instead of picking up a new book immediately after closing the first, I go back and write down my favorite quotes in a commonplace book, along with some reactions and reflections on the work.

If I had a birthday or Christmas recently, I write down the gifts and cards and sentiments I received and begin the process of writing thank-you notes. I started a small notebook just to keep track of letters I have sent and received; it really helps with remembering the last time I heard from a friend or sent one to them.

I write letters to my kids for them to read when they're older, little missives to give them a picture of our lives now, so that they'll know how much I've always loved them.

I work on photo albums and photo-books, deliberately sifting through the thousands of digital photos to find the hundred or so that really tell a story.

I write down the parts of my family tree that I know about and reach out to relatives to learn about the gaps in my knowledge of my family's past.

I revisit the goals from earlier in the year, not just to see what I've accomplished, but to keep myself on track and assess what was just a whim.

None of these things indulges my need to feel productive. These things don't add up to another book on my reading list or another follower on my substack. They don't even answer the more mundane need for a meal plan. (Don't talk to me about my meal plan.)

But I've found that the deepest meaning doesn't come from ticking off another item on my to-do list or squeezing another podcast into my multitasking. The real thing I'm chasing, which the "productive" feeling merely echoes, is found in focusing my attention on the right thing at the right time, whether that's a person, an essay, or a dirty dish.

Knowing which is the right thing requires reflection, and memory-keeping helps me do that. Yet, as I hasten to remind myself, memory-keeping matters for its own sake, too.

With a little more space around for writing, I'll hopefully have one of those half-finished essays ready for you soon. After my three-month break from regular posting, I should have new essays up every other week now. Thank you for bearing with mex and thank you for joining me today.