Whenever I browse through some of my older writings, I am surprised by people’s names. Are these real? By and by, much of my past strikes me as good as fiction.

Addendum I (August 18, 2016)

Now I am spending ever more of my time reading my own writings, and I am often surprised by names of friends and acquaintances that I cannot place at all. I occasionally spend quite a while trying to jog my memory, but to no avail. Try as I may, I cannot remember anything about the people whose names are staring at me, let alone their faces or the sound of their voices. The very fact that these names appear in my writings suggests reasonable closeness at the time of writing, which only adds to the mystery. But it is enough for me to remember all the cities where I have lived over the years to realize that remembering all the people I have met in them is rather improbable. Every move has made so many names pretty useless, too. Slowly but surely, my writings are thus losing their ties with reality in my own mind. By the time I let out the ghost, nearly everything I have ever written will have turned into fiction and nothing but fiction.

Addendum II (August 11, 2018)

I am delighted by this haiku and the first addendum, which I came across entirely by chance on one of my uncharted journeys through my writings. And delighted is the word. Zagreb, Belgrade, Cambridge, Ljubljana, Reading, London, Motovun, Zagreb… In hindsight, the circle is amazing to behold. Not surprisingly, I have known hundreds and maybe even thousands of people in each of the cities and towns listed. Remembering them all is well beyond the ken of any human being, let alone one who is in his early seventies already. Had I not written down so many people’s names, they would have vanished from my mind without a trace. It all boils down to my writing habits, as well as to my life span, which stretches ever longer. The longer I live, the more is my magnum opus bound to strike me as fiction. Which is just to my liking, I dare say at this point in time. Reliving much of what I have written down would be nothing if not horrendous. More often than not, the distance provided by poor recollection is a welcome shield. Luckily, it will only get bulkier and sturdier with the passage of time. This is hardly an exaggeration. By and by, the shield will become nigh impregnable. Phew!