You can exist in time without much history. It is matter of seeing the present as an ever-present Presence and changes in this as being changes in emphasis, in what is foreground and what is background, as if you are merely exploring the same unchanging site, alive but outside of time. Whether this is 'better' than history or not is another matter. It certainly does not prevent a fascination with stories, with histories, probably even increases it, but in a strangely detached manner. It might just be a function of defective memory, or a memory that is too full, that is almost used up. A change that is itself historical but not seen as so.