The Haircut
I try to remember the last time I got my hair cut, but I can’t.
I decide to make up a story narrating the event. I imagine that I went to a barbershop in a Hotel and there I met a friendly guy who cut my hair.
But that story doesn’t feel real; something is wrong with it. It doesn’t serve as a substitute for what really happened, even though I still can’t remember it. I create a couple more stories, but none of them feel real.
All of the sudden I remember the circumstances in which I got my haircut. There is no doubt about the reality of that version of the event.
But what makes that story real? Why can I label my fictions fiction and the real story real?
The trail left by the present moment is my past. When I look backwards in time I can identify a clear connection between what happened the last time I cut my hair and now (i.e. after I cut my hair that day I went to a store in front of the barbershop and I bought the sweater I’m wearing today.)
My actual circumstances make necessary that such story is the only possible one and therefore the real one. Any alteration to the original story makes it inconsistent with the present moment.
In other words, the only story that resonates and reinforces the "now" is the one I call my past. All other possible stories are out of face with the present; those are the ones I call fictions.
