Not picking on you but the subject is of interest to me.

I work in an extended care facility and talk to many older people on the edge of death. They are often bored and one thing I ask them is: "Have they written their memoirs yet"? No is the answer and when I ask why they most likely say they have never done anything interesting in their lives. To put that in perspective, most of these people are from a cultural group that faced religious persecution in the soviet union, WW2 in Eastern Europe, post war flight or emigration to other countries but they still think they have nothing worth remembering.

It makes me sad for them and their families because both my mother and father passed away early without relating much of their history and we were left more or less guessing to fill in the blanks about their lives before we came into the picture. I was fortunate that I collected photographs and some geneology before my mothers passing or we, and all the grandkids etc.. would have no connection to our past. The only thing we have to pass on is our stories and when we die, the totality of our experience dies with us unless we pass that along in some form or another. I plan to fill in those gaps for my kids. The other day I attended a Scandinavian festival with my 19 YO son and he apparently did not even realize he was 1/4 Norwegian. Both grandparents on that side are dead so he only really has a living history of the maternal side. I spent the day relating what I knew from my research but again, if I were not a collector of stories that would be lost to him and his siblings and their children.

There is also a large portion of my life that occured before I met and married my wife of which my children either a. don't know about or b. don't believe I really did. When they are ready I mean to have a record available to them. Not just of what I did but of what I thought at the time and how my perceptions of life developed and evolved. I hope this will help them to understand me better and guide their own outlook on life. The written record is important in that sense because their lifestyle and mine are very different at the moment (computers vs outdoor pursuits) and there isn't the ability to share experiences in real life in a way that I'd like but accept.

I also think we gain inspiration from others, especially in the small things where we feel we are the only ones who are going through a process like a spouse or child dying, job loss, etc... We all have a wealth of experience but most feel theirs is not important. One may say they don't believe in journaling or memoirs or collecting and transmitting experiences but that's the entire premise this sub forum is based on and what other sites like CGOAB are about.

Lastly, who's to say what is important to relate and whats not. If one looks at Walden by Henry Thoreau it's just a story about some dude that lived in a cabin by a lake and grew beans for a stretch. He didn't do anything really interesting but it is considered a seminal work for those of a naturalist bent because he recorded his thoughts and feelings while doing so. History made it important but at the time it was just a journal.