We often tend to perceive and remember only what we consider novel or important. The rest is indiscriminately dumped and forgotten. This has probably to do with that the brain is developed more to predict the future than to receive the past. The brain helps us to navigate safely, recognising and remember danger so that we could avoid it in the future. For that purposes a few key perceptions are enough. If the brain stored every perception in complete detail, there would be an explosive circuit overload. Memories recreated in the brain through convergence zones, "neurobiological crossroads" where some of memory's many strands briefly meet to conjure up images of the past. These zones store only that information necessary to reassemble the approximate record from neural firing patterns held in reserve at other sites in the brain. For example a sunrise activate different regions of the brain were busy processing data regarding the colour of the clouds. The sound of any birds that may have been singing; the smells in the air; the emotions that you were feeling and thoughts you were thinking; as well as thousands of other impressions and sensations. All of this was held for an instant as a pattern of ignited neurones and chattering synapses. But this massive load of data is never collected into one place for processing and interpretation. Instead, it remains distributed over a wide area of the brain. This is where the convergence zone comes in. When we recall a person or an event, the convergence zone serves as a kind of neurobiological instruction manual, directing the appropriate neurones in the appropriate brain regions to reassemble themselves in a firing pattern that approximates that of the original experience. When you view the clouds at the dawn it set off a chain reaction of neural firing in your brain. For example the shape of the clouds reminded you of a particular book. The convergence zone - perhaps with the aid of biochemical bookmarks - dutifully triggered the reaction of a synaptic pattern, that exactly corresponded to your glimpse of a volume in mottled Spanish binding you saw only once at a completely different time and in a completely different place. The memories are thus not recreated accurate in every detail. They are replications, not duplications, of the original event. Convergence zones provide the score, but it's up to the synaptic ensembles involved in each individual memory to make the music. And just as with any musical performance, it's impossible to play the same note exactly the same time twice. Whenever we recall a given object or experience we do not get an exact reproduction but an interpretation, a newly reconstructed version of the original. Memory is a constant work-in-progress. When an object or experience is recalled, the neural pattern corresponding to that memory flashes through the brain as clearly and as quickly as lighting bolt. But like lighting, it is as swiftly gone. And the next time that same event is remembered the pattern will be different, changed by a complex network of new associations and experiences. See and compare with my own reflections in the beginning!