I write this coming home after a night out. The cab takes me past the place I lived when I was a kid, then slowly travels the last mile towards where I reside now. I used to feel smug about living in London my whole life, as though I’d somehow experienced more than those who’d come here from small towns or villages. I was clubbing in the west end at fifteen, what could surprise me about city living?
But I am too sheltered, and that shelter doesn’t always provide comfort. I live a fifteen minute drive from the hospital I was born in. Fifteen minutes from the first place I called home. And five minutes from the house I spent my teenage years in. My parents live a 2 minute walk away. And that’s not an exaggeration, if I screamed from my front door, they might hear me.
Most of the friends I grew up with have naturally moved away, for some it was to seek bigger things, others just wanted to escape the confines of where they were born. But I stayed, partly out of fear of change and partly out of a deep seated love of the familiarity my area gives me.
Sometimes the two are indistinguishable.
As a result, nostalgia hits me in the gut more often than feels comfortable. The ghosts of my past are all around me, even if the real people have gone. There’s the road I kissed my first boyfriend on. There’s the bench to commemorate my friend who died a few years ago. There’s that pub which is no longer a pub but luxury flats. We used to drink late into the night there, huge groups of us, long scattered. All these faces I knew so well, all still young and flushed in my memory.
It’s London, but it’s a village nonetheless. I know the local gossip to an extent. I know which shop is doing badly. I meet the same faces in the small park near my place, all of whom know my dogs name even if they forget mine. I approach middle age and the clubs I went to are long gone, turned into estate agents and Pret A Manger’s and still I pass them and remark to nobody “I was there.” All these memories preserved in aspic, but there to confront me every day.
Is it cowardice to stay in one place too long? Or is it sane, a resolute refusal to change one thing when everything changes so much, often without you being ready for it? More than anything else, it’s privilege. I haven’t had to leave the place I know when so many wish to stay where they’re born and can’t. But since I have that privilege, am I wasting it to stay still?
This level of nostalgia feels stifling sometimes. And the oddest part is nearly all these memories which rugby tackle me almost daily are presented as happy. Even when I know they weren’t. I see a building, or a pub or a glimpse of a shop sign and the memories which accompany them are all rose tinted. When I interrogate that a little, I remember that the events I’m thinking about were certainly not all happy. There’s the uni building I had so many panic attacks in I had to drop out. There’s the flat a man once tried to have sex with me in when I was asleep. There’s the spot my boyfriend cheated on me and I cried alone until a taxi driver took pity on me. So many heartbreaking moments. And yet, my brain attempts to tell me they’re all good memories. Why?
I have a theory. For me, anxiety is an intolerance of uncertainty. I look to the future and mostly feel apprehensive. I don’t know what will happen. I try to, in big and small ways. I’ll Google the end of a film while I’m watching it, which is objectively insane. I’ll pester my husband about what Christmas present he’s giving me, as though it’ll somehow release tension in me. I try not to practice all my long held ocd compulsions which “guarantee the right result” (did you know if you blink the right number of times your family will be safe?).
But the past? It’s certain. It’s done and we know what happened, even if at the time it was less than ideal. Even if it was downright miserable. It’s known and therefore my brain has marked it safe, allowing it to now feel warm and cosy and alluring. That means now, when I walk by the grassy bank in the local park where I thought I was falling in love with someone only to later find out he had a girlfriend, it looks so beautiful. It means the church where I got married first time round is a place of calm despite the marriage being anything but. Even the old flat where a man who was stalking me turned up and terrified the life out of me only prompts a sort of vaguely pleasant feeling.
I was trying to think of what this reminds me of, and I’ve realised it’s the way a certain right wing tabloid constantly runs photos of the U.K. in olden times. It mostly looks shabby, tired, unpleasant and yet the headline always says something like “when Britain was GREAT.” As if the past was better just because the photos are sepia tinged and people wore more hats. There was a likelihood you’d get some awful disease and die before you were twenty, but look! Hats! It’s a dangerous trap to fall into, nostalgia.
I’m not leaving. But I need to remind my anxious brain that the past wasn’t certain then, and it’s not glorious just because it’s done. And in the same vein, the future isn’t terrible just because it’s not promised.
Recommendations -
Watch all seasons of Ghosts on bbc iPlayer. Gentle, unfolding comedy we binged over Christmas and now miss greatly.
If you’re living in London and love nail art check out my friend Naoise who I went to art school with and who is so talented.
https://instagram.com/ninisnails_ldn?igshid=YmMyMTA2M2Y=
Speaking of nostalgia - here’s a song I sang to my nephew recently which transported me back to my youth -
The past is another country. I can never remember who said that, but it feels so true. I'm not one for nostalgia, personally, but our memories can be kind to us. They are never accurate but are moulded into what suits us for that particular day, which can be quite nice (or sometimes not!)
I live in another country, so my feelings of nostalgia is sometimes overwhelming. I dream about my old childhood home and people I've known. But in the scheme of things I'm happy to have made a new life abroad and so grateful for video calls. I've another family, had to make new friends and negotiate a different language which was hard in the beginning. I'm now settled and happy but still have these huge waves of nostalgia sometimes.