Rebuilding Rob

What makes you feel nostalgic?

I guess it’s only appropriate that our final writing prompt of 2023 has to do with nostalgia. Nostalgia is one of those words that we all have an operating definition for, but every now and then you need to look up the dictionary definition for it just for clarity’s sake.

In a nutshell, nostalgia is longing for the past. What a prompt is basically asking us today is what are things that make us long for the past. That’s a pretty broad question when one really stops to think about it. Essentially, it’s like asking “what things activate good memories? so my answer today will be nowhere near comprehensive, but it will give you a pretty good insight into Retro Rob.

A lot of people will tell you that it could be something as simple as sensory input – a sight, a sound, a taste, or a smell will trigger nostalgia.

In a clip from the Ken Burns documentary Baseball, writer Robert Creamer recalls a time was deployed overseas during a World War II. He was in a PX, when a senior officer walked by, pulled out and lit a cigar. Upon smelling that burning cigar , Creamer says it was almost like he was transported back to the concourses at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn. That cigar smell, he implied, triggered memories of attending baseball games at Ebbets Field. It was nostalgic.

Unfortunately, for me, I don’t have a terribly strong sense of smell. In the very least, I’m not very good at identifying sense. So I usually have to depend more on sites or sounds, or even general sensations to trigger nostalgia for me.

“And as I think back makes me wonder how
The smell from a grill could spark up nostalgia”

“Summertime” – DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince

Music

First and foremost, I’m a child of the 80s and a young adult of the 90s. So by default, memories of those two decades are going to automatically qualify.

The pop and new wave music of the early 80s, the hair metal of the late 80s, and the alternative rock of the late 80s and early 90s probably trigger the most nostalgia for me musical.ly. This isn’t to say that other genres of music or from earlier decades don’t trigger from memories for me as well. But those aforementioned genres from those times are what I usually associate with more of the good times in my life. Specifically, my youth and early adulthood.

I noticed sometime in my late teens and early 20s, sometime – around the early 90s – that I would automatically connect a song, usually one that I was hearing in that particular moment, with an event in my life.

Take the song “Fell on Black Days” by Soundgarden. I was never a huge Soundgarden fan. To be honest, I liked more of Chris Cornell’s solo work and the work he did with Audioslave than I did Soundgarden. It’s not to say that I didn’t like Soundgarden, it’s just that they weren’t a band that I really connected with.

There was a young woman who I had briefly dated around the time (94) she would be my first lesson in not letting feelings develop too deeply, too quickly for a person. Anyway, there was one night when we were making out and that song came on the radio. I don’t know if I said it out loud or not, but I remember thinking to myself I’m going to associate this song with this moment forever. Lo and behold, nearly 30 years later, that moment immediate comes to mind whenever I hear that song.

Television and movies.

The funny thing about nostalgia is that it forces us to see things through rose-colored glasses. Nostalgia has a way of making us remember things as actually being better than they were. Take movies and television for instance. I would argue that movies hold up slightly better than television shows; but the affect is the same.

Living in the 500 channel universe means that it’s not difficult to finds reruns of some of my favorite tv shows do the 80s and early 90s. Shows like Who’s the Boss?, Family Ties, G.I., Joe and The Transformers come to mind. Watching these reruns today, I can see that the plots of tv shows from that time were relatively simple, and not very well written at that.

Having said that, my enjoyment – my nostalgic memories – of these shows aren’t really tainted. These shows still remind me of a happier, simpler time in my life. Those memories of the past are more than make up for any plot holes or lack of strong acting.

I’m sure I could probably write a book about this phenomenon, but I think you get the idea. Nostalgia is an amazing sensation that it immediately takes us back to a better, happier time. But nostalgia also has a way of embellishing those memories for us. Nostalgia makes us believe that things were actually better back then than they often were.

The irony of this being WordPress’s writing prompt on the final day of 2023 does not escape me. I’ve been thinking and planning for the future during these last few weeks than I probably have at any other time in my life.

While we all have nothing but high hopes and good feelings about the coming year, the reality is life is going to happen, good and bad. We are all going to continue moving steadily forward at a rate of 60 seconds per minute into the future. Although there will inevitably be tough times ahead, I sincerely hope and wish for the safest and happiest of New Years!

Thanks for stopping by Rebuilding Rob. Be sure to like, comment and subscribe to my blog below. It’s greatly appreciated! Also, feel free to follow me on social media as well! Check out my most recent posts as well as some earlier related posts…

• Of Training Wheels and Christmas Lights
• Charity Starts at Home (And I’m Back in My Childhood One)
• The Muscle of Empathy
• Where Do We Go From Here? Five Years Since January 6.
• Bugs, Boundaries, and the Art of Not Being Invisible

The article “Retro Rob” first appeared on Rebuilding Rob