Tag: Reminiscence

The Bittersweetness of Nostalgia 

Nostalgia is one strong feeling. Perhaps, one of the strongest. 

It can make you travel back in time, take you back to the bitter and sweet memories where you can almost hear your mother calling for you in the distance so that you don’t miss the school bus. You can almost feel the dejection you felt when your best friend doesn’t come to school, the fear when you forget your notebook at home. You can almost feel your mother’s arms wrapped around you, shielding you from any harm that comes your way. 

You can almost feel all these emotions but still can’t reach them. There is a wall that impedes you to truly and wholly be in those memories and that wall is reality. 

Nostalgia is always asserted with a miniscule of woe that constantly reminds you that you can never truly travel back in time. If only we could be a part of those foggy memories, we would feel complete. If only we could go back to the times when you fought with your sibling over the T.V. remote, we would be satisfied, our thirst for absolute satisfaction would be quenched.

But isn’t it this yearning, this longing that makes memories what they are, makes us value and treasure those moments as much as we do. If we could, in reality go back in time we wouldn’t value them enough, we would start to treat them the way we treat a myriad of things.

That pain, that longing is an evergoing epiphany, whispering into your ear, reminding you of the distance that exists between you and the past. That reminder makes you want to grip harder onto those memories, making you want to stay there.

That reminder also stops you from taking things for granted. That doesn’t mean that you have to be extremely conscious of every moment you experience or every step you take, it just means that you have to cherish them at the time of their occurrence. Maybe you can remind yourself of all these things when you are in a foul mood or maybe even value the people more, take care of them and appreciate them. Tell them how you feel about them because they too, will go away someday and never come back.

It is not necessary that we all would be able to appreciate and cherish anything in our lives after reading an article, in fact these realisations will occur out of the blue, at times you don’t expect. It could be a time of grief for you, or visiting your old house, a breakup or just a conversation with an old friend which can ultimately driving you down a road of deep thought, maybe even leaving you confused.

Nothing can remedy this woe, no one should even try to remedy it, let yourself feel this woe, dive into those memories, dwell into those moments but don’t let them consume you for you still have a multitude of memories to make and reminisce over in future.

The crazy ball and the crazy me

Photo by NEOSiAM 2021 on Pexels.com

The balls above bring back memories. Don’t they? Well, they definitely do for me. When I was a kid, mobiles weren’t very popular and so we had to look for other sources of entertainment that included many board games, those plastic bats, plastic cars and later on those remote controlled ones, a soap bubble maker, stuffed cartoons and bears, cartoon characters in balloons and balls- football, stumper ball, leather balls, table tennis balls, plastic balls, even golf balls, balloon balls and my personal favourite -the crazy balls.

Well, what’s so special about them, you ask. Nothing much, except that once thrown they bounce back soo high and the fact that they come in such attractive colors- neon, green, pink, blue, a mixture of pink and blue, green and yellow and soo many more and the rubber like texture of the balls. You couldn’t help but love it.

And this one fine day, when I was out with my mother and visited a stationery, I saw these crazy balls. Not one or two, but a whole packet. I couldn’t believe they still sell this. Now-a-day, kids have so many sources of entertainment and when they do play outside, it’s usually in those professional stadiums. I thought they had stopped making them. So anyways, when I saw the packet, I couldn’t help but want one. With the best puppy like face I could muster, I looked at my mother and pleaded to have one. My mother looked at me in all her seriousness and she said and I directly quote- “Why do you need one? Are you a kid?”. It was when it stuck me, I wasn’t a kid anymore. I was supposed to be all serious and mature. But then again, feeling that child like excitement once again, after soo long felt strange but it felt soo good. I couldn’t help but want it- both that feeling and the crazy ball. And so I looked at my mother and said, “Yes, I am only a kid “. She smiled. What more could she have said and when I didn’t budge she allowed me to have one. Just like those old days, choosing one was soo difficult. There were soo many colors- neon, green, pink, blue, a mixture of pink and blue, green and yellow, red and green. I took the pink and blue ball and clutched it tightly in my hand all the way back home. The crazy ball sure has me crazy over it. So, gotta go. I still have to play with it. And so, if you ever come across any of those or any of your personal favourites, embrace them. Be a kid. Life is short, the pandemic has taught us this, but our childhood was even shorter. And we all miss it somewhere, sometimes. So when life gives you moments like these, don’t just sit and recollect. Go ahead and relive.