My Years With Proust - Day 710

   How often had all these people-reappeared before me in the course of their lives, the diverse circumstances of which seemed to present the same individuals always, but in forms and for purposes that were shifting and varied! And the diversity of the points in my life through which, like so many interwoven threads, those of each of these personages had passed had in the end brought into conjunction even those that seemed the farthest apart from one another, as though for the execution of infinitely varied patterns life possessed only a limited number of threads.

Marcel Proust, Time Regained, p. 1019

Marcel continues to stroll through the party after his long absence because of his long-standing health challenges.  It seems that every turn brought a new memory, and a new reflection:  "How often had all these people-reappeared before me in the course of their lives, the diverse circumstances of which seemed to present the same individuals always, but in forms and for purposes that were shifting and varied!"  Marcel, as we all do in a similar situation, and for that matter every day, tried to tie it all together in a coherent narrative.  He also understands that in the process of doing so he was bringing the different threads together in ways, and in closer contact, that were not truly representative of the different parts of his life.  Think of the times when you've run into someone out of their appropriate context.  For instance, you're on vacation a thousand miles from home and you run into someone from your hometown, and your mind madly works to make sense of it, including creating a false narrative to explain the discordance.  Even when you're left alone, and the mind, never sleeping, plays games with the different persons and places and times of your life.  Maybe someone showing up in an unexpected place and time in a dream, which seems disarmingly illogical, doesn't happen as often as she or he logically should.