This is the difficulty that Johnny Solo had: He had been told at school that he should learn and remember. It was only after a portion of his brain departed from him (e18) and he had divested himself of his skin (e19) that Johnny realised that what distinguished him from the clever machines that surrounded him was the ability he had to forget and to not know. He realised that he could make up for the distance between isolated islands of knowledge by inventing, and that after a time, his ability to forget was more important to him than his ability to remember.
He did his best to extend the route between one matter of fact and another, navigating their shores and heading out, propelled by ever more powerful tides of forgetfulness. In time he would teach himself not to read or count, which would steer him into even more expansive oceans, where it would always be year zero and the things on the islands he passed would take on an unfamiliar shape and nature......
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