Now I know what this is all about

I began this process of remembering every day that passes over 3000 days ago.

I continue to pin an image to my mental calendar at the end of every day as a memory tag.

But as I've been recording here, it has become increasingly harder to refresh the images.

Several times I've thought of giving it up as an experiment that has reached its natural end.

But I haven't. During the current coronavirus pandemic lockdown, the memory tags mean I can distinguish between days with few distinguishing features and mark the passage of time. Otherwise they would just be a blur.

More importantly, I've now realised what this process is all about.

I had hoped it would induce hyperthymesia, a rare ability to access all memories as if they are fresh. That hasn't happened. It seems that I need to review the images pinned to my mental calendar once per month to be able to remember them easily next time around. It's a memory exercise. It hasn't rewired my brain to make recall effortless.

Now there are too many days to run through all the images on that timescale, even though the process I use has evolved over time. My current method is to run through a year of memories over the course of a week or more. There are now approaching 9 years to cover.

I was becoming frustrated because sometimes I'd hit blanks and either take a break for a few days or jump ahead and hope I could come back and fill in the blanks - which generally does work.

Yet, as the reviews have taken longer, the monthly target of reviewing each image has become a forlorn hope and I face the prospect of each review being harder every time and blank days appearing and joining up into voids in my memory.

Just like the years before I began this process, where the reference points are few and far between.

But it struck me as I was recalling images of my mother, now in the later stage of Alzheimer's where she no longer remember me or her husband of 62 years, that this experiment was always about remembering.

Remembering the days I have lived. The people I love. The experiences we have shared. The places we have been.

I've currently been progressing through 2016. Before my mother's illness was bad, but when there were signs of it. Those signs are more poignant now. The times of normality and happiness more precious. Revisiting the past continues to be enriching as I see it differently as my vantage point changes and its impact on the present also changes.

Going through these memory tags in the past few days, it struck me that this is no longer principally to refresh the images for my memory trick. I am going to stop worrying that it's taking far longer than a month to complete the cycle. That pressure is off.

I'll finish this year in the time it takes. Then move onto the next in the same way. But without pressure to hit some target of weeks or months covered in each period.

It is only the recent days where discipline is required to establish the images.

I am savouring remembering. Filling in most of the blanks. Sometimes resorting to looking back at pictures on my phone - which is not cheating, as I set the rule. A photograph can orientate me and suddenly unlock a whole sequence of memories.

Even as some images slip away from me, the memories of these years are far richer than the previous decades of my life. And I will continue to add my memory tag for each day.

This was always about remembering.