A Clear Memory of:

When my wife and I spend nights together away from home, we take our modest silver collection and hide it. I always hide the silver in a place I'll call the rumpus room, but last time I decided instead to put it in the chaos room. Now whenever one makes such a momentous change, it's really important to remember it. I didn't relish coming home, looking in the old place and wondering where our silver was. But I now realize that I constructed the wrong memory. I carefully imagined myself putting the silver in the new place, the chaos room ...

So here it is, a few days later, and I go to get the silver. Of course I go to the usual old place, and it's not there. My heart stops for just a little while, then I think hard and I remember: of course, the chaos room! And all is well. With hindsight I can assure you that I should have constructed the following memory instead: Imagining myself looking in the rumpus room and saying, oh, the silver's in the chaos room!