_In light of critical environmental concerns, the U.S.  government is implementing a new economic system where memories are utilized as currency. This innovative approach aims to reduce resource consumption and waste by shifting value from material goods to personal experiences. Citizens will now trade, store, and utilize memories in transactions, promoting a sustainable and conscious lifestyle. This system encourages deeper connections and a shared sense of community, ensuring our planet's future while preserving the richness of human experiences. Together, we can create a prosperous, environmentally friendly society._

_“Bullshit,” _I muttered under my breath. We didn’t trade memories with other people, we relinquished them to the government to do God knows what with. Probably download them onto microchips or use them to inspire the latest blockbusters instead of just adequately paying writers. The ads were making the switch sound deceptively Utopian, and as if it were done in the name of saving Mother Earth versus making citizens dumb and emotionless, less human than neanderthals.

There’s a memory bank on every street corner now. Sterile, gleaming white, liminal. Smooth walls like an uncorticalized brain. You get strapped down and project what you’re willing to forfeit upon the screens of your fluttering eyelids. The cozier, more Hallmark-esque memories are pretty lucrative, but the sick fucks that pull the puppet strings have have an aquired taste for anything traumatic. They find such memories “inspiring.”

As much as it’s enticing to wipe away my demons like an Etch-a-Sketch, a stubborn thread in my moral fabric finds that to be the coward’s way out. Playing God in a sense. All the stimuli I’ve been subjected to, it was to teach me something. To chemically alter me, so I don’t stagnate. Stagnation is a fate worse than death.

At first, I refused to part with any memory no matter how seemingly inane. Not my grocery list, not the two second conversation I had with my landlord about the weather. Not a single increment of time, a single breath or heartbeat. 

My friend, Lylah, did not understand my obstinance. “You’re not going to be able to pay your rent if you keep this strange superiority act up.” 

My apartment complex had been one of the last to accept traditional cash. That had been overturned once they stopped manufacturing physical currency, and what remained was turned over to the government or sent to museums. Ah, museums, such a futile attraction now that the bourgeois who could afford such a luxury were increasingly lobotomized and unable to interpret the knowledge before them.

I knew Lylah had a practical point despite my resentment toward her perception of my intentions. I didn’t have a superiority complex. I didn’t feel like a heroic martyr. I was fucking terrified, in a position where I was going to slowly starve unless I hollowed out my brain cavities and gave away my most precious commodity.

Still, I couldn’t hold out forever, so I highlighted a distinction: short term memory, long term memory, and the unconscious mind. Unable to trust the memory bank workers to not take more than I was willing to give, I made sure to repress my most precious memories before each session by redirecting my consciousness toward an alternative memory. Each alternative memory was something I could regain easily. For example, I would read a novel before each session. I would write a concise, spoiler-free review and write it in my notebook so I could remember why I liked or disliked each book. Then I could reread it later if the review recommended. This was actually decently nifty, as I could wipe my memory of my favorite books and experience them again, entirely fresh.

I soon realized my experience wasn’t typical. Most people don’t get to choose which memories are taken. They are at the mercy of wherever their fight or flight steers them. Often, their most significant memories surface during the emotional distress of the operation, sometimes the memories they fear losing the most. My frequent mediations and repression sessions were somewhat anomalous, but they truly helped protect my most coveted data in my cognitive cache. I would recommend this strategy to others if I could get away with it.

One day, I experimented. I let a slightly more significant childhood memory surface as I was strapped down at the operating table. I tried to use sensory input to trigger the memory in the aftermath; the scent of my childhood blanket. I inhaled the nostalgic musk, felt an inexplicable pang in my chest, and that was it. I couldn’t remember what I intended to. I was very frustrated, until later I realized I had written it in my notebook just in case of this very outcome. I grinned to myself, of course I’d planned ahead.

My notebook was the greatest loophole. Of course it wasn’t as all-consumingly evocative as a traditional memory, but with adequate imagery and metaphor, it was like redownloading a slightly shittier recording of an old familiar song. 

But what would happen after my loophole was confiscated?

(this is underdeveloped bc i’m too tired to keep writing rn before times up but i wanted to incorporated more psychology shit into this as it’s a very cool concept i can continue this if anyone cares to read n just generally flesh out the rushed half-ideas)