"A sense of security, of well-being, of summer warmth pervades my memory. That robust reality makes a ghost of the present. The mirror brims with brightness; a bumblebee has entered the room and bumps against the ceiling. Everything is as it should be, nothing will ever change, nobody will ever die." - Speak, Memory, page 77.
This particular quote had quite an impact on me. I kind of like the idea of making a ghost of the present instead of a ghost of the past. I think more often than not, we think of our past in ghost-like terms - it is wispy, phantom-like and surreal. But what if our memories are so tangible and palpable that it is our present that becomes dreamlike and unreal? I often think back into my childhood into a time when security, well-being and summer warmth pervade my memory. A time when my family was still together. A time when my mother was still alive. I lost my mother three years ago, and sometimes it seems as if this world in which she no longer exists is the phantom world; a ghost of the present. My robust reality is the memories I have of her - the security and well-being she provided me. The only way I can interact with her now is through my memories. The world in which I remember her is the real world. In that world she is still alive and well and everything, as Nobokov says, is as it should be.
