Body in the Big Apple

Начало книги

The present contains nothing more than the past, and what is found in the effect was already in the cause.

—HENRI BERGSON

Prologue

Memories are our waking dreams.

Certain scenes recalled fill our minds with the immediacy of the present, though the event is long past.

We hear words and are convinced we are remembering what was actually said. We see a room in exact detail.

The particular drapes at a window—the fall of the fabric, the texture of the cloth. The flowers in a vase, their fragrance tenacious. The taste of a perfectly ripe pear, its juice sticky and sweet. Not the vague recollection of someone, but his very presence. Warm skin—in need of a shave, the feel of the slight bristle against the caress of a cheek.

Yet other memories can be revived only obliquely.

These tend to move persistently out of reach, slipping further and further away as we struggle to remember them. Tantalizing. How old was I? Which house was it?

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