Record your grandparents telling a story, even a boring one. Someday their voice will be the thing you’d pay anything to hear.

A voice carries what a transcript cannot: the pace, the laugh in the wrong place, the way a sentence trails off. Photographs are everywhere and recordings are rare, because nobody thinks a familiar voice is worth saving while it is still in the next room. What the story is about matters far less than you would guess.

Put your phone on the table during an ordinary conversation and press record, with permission first. Ask about a house they lived in, or a job they had. Save it somewhere other than your phone, because phones get lost.