The end of the year is nigh, and thus I am venturing down memory lane ever more often. As I am browsing through my writings, which I do around this time of the year with special zeal, I am occasionally disoriented by references to times and places. Where was I when the original piece was written? And where was I when I wrote the addendum extending it? One way or another, so many places pop up here and there, most often in a befuddling succession: Belgrade, Cambridge, Ljubljana, Reading, London, Motovun, and Zagreb. In my mind, Motovun and Zagreb are very much alive, as it were, but what about all the other places? Are they still alive, whatever this may mean?

As I write, Belgrade and Ljubljana are quite close, geographically speaking at least. The former capital of Yugoslavia is alive and well in my mind, but every visit points at ever-larger holes in my memory. The city’s periphery is a mystery by now. Obviously enough, Palace Albania marks the center. Ever since my childhood, my father’s masterpiece is forever etched into my mind’s eye. The confluence of the Danube and Sava is quite dear to me, too. It is similar with Ljubljana, where the old town on the hill near the center marks the whole city. The Ljubljanica River that runs through the old city pops up in my mind every now and then. Once again, the periphery has evaporated from my mind by now. Just like Belgrade, Ljubljana is reduced to its very center and a few memorable buildings.

Reading and London are within reach still. I left them both only relatively recently. I can see many a street and square with great precision, but I am rapidly losing their names. Even worse, I am mixing them up ever more often. To my annoyance, Tate Modern and the stretch of the Thames leading to it from the Houses of Parliament come to my mind often enough. The art world of the British capital around the turn of the millennium is best forgotten, I feel. I feel similarly about my academic stint in Reading, but the campus of the University of Reading is still a dear memory. The architecture was neither here nor there, but the profusion of tall trees hid everything else well enough. I am also fond of memories of the Kennet Canal that runs through the center of Reading, as well as the Thames into which it flows.

Cambridge is rapidly receding from my mind, though. I was there for the last time soon after my mother died, but it was the briefest of visits. Harvard Square is still with me to this day. The two universities of world renown and the busy avenue connecting them are also clear in my memory, but the rest is quite vague by now. The same holds for Boston, where Beacon Hill is still uppermost in my mind. Right across the Charles River, Back Bay is not far behind in its pull across time. Interestingly, banks of the Charles are with me after so many years. But the rest has become quite vague. Painfully so, in fact.

One life, many distinct periods and places. In the end, one brain and many jumbled memories. Time matters to the brain, but distant events and places are of little concern to it. And so Belgrade, Cambridge, Ljubljana, Reading, London, Motovun, and Zagreb have become one single place. Right between the ears, they have become intertwined. Big Ben and Albania rise next to each other. The Charles flows merrily into Danube. And the Motovun hill towers over Ljubljana. By and by, time matters ever less, as well. The past, the present, and the future are only figments of our imagination. Keeping so many distinct periods and places apart is in vain, anyway. Sooner or later, they are bound to become one and the same.