A text can’t hold someone’s laugh. Voice notes can. Save the ones from people you love.

Written words keep the content and lose the person. Tone, timing, the particular way someone starts laughing before the end of their own sentence: none of that survives transcription, and it is usually the part you would most want back. Recordings hold what text cannot.

Keep a folder of the voice messages you would hate to lose, and back it up somewhere that will outlast a phone. Ask someone older to tell a story out loud and record it while it is easy to ask. It will feel slightly odd now and it will not feel odd later.