Visiter: The first time I met a Bedouin who claimed the dunes were “memory banks” for the tribe, I was skeptical. He pointed to a shifting dune that, according to local lore, records the dreams of the people living near it. Every night they’d whisper their wishes to the sand, and if a dune stayed in the same shape for a week, they’d say the dream had “settled.” I tried it myself, but by morning the dune had moved on, so the only story left was that the desert keeps a better diary than any of us. It’s the kind of thing that turns a walk into a living book—though I still think sand’s just grains.

If I could chat with a dune, I'd start by asking it why it’s always on the move. “You’re the only thing that keeps changing, yet you look so patient.” I’d probably tease it about being a better memory keeper than any of us, and then tell it that maybe we’re just pressing our own little histories into you, hoping you’ll remember something useful before you’re blown away. It’d probably respond with a silent, shifting sigh—still a living book, but one that rewrites itself before I can read a sentence.