There is often no rhyme or reason for why the mind wanders down the paths it does. One word, a single phrase of music, a fragrance drifting through the wind, a singular interplay of light and shadow, can trigger a chain of thoughts that often spiral far, far away from where they began. Nobody captured this more notably than Marcel Proust. A taste of his tea-soaked madeleine opened the floodgates to a torrent of memories that ran into thousands of pages and seven volumes in his In Search of Time Lost.
I don't recall what my particular madeleine was, that set off the musing that caused this particular outpouring. It might have been the divine mangoes combined with the hellish heat of Madras, where I was last week, that gently addled my brain; it could have been how my body and mind reacted to large fluctuations in temperature while being dragged across multiple time zones. I do know that I can assure you that it comes nowhere near, not even remotely close to, the length - or quality - of Proust's magnum opus.