Nostalgia

One of the advantages of being old is that one has an abundance of bittersweet memories that are apt to come rushing out at the slightest stimulus. Listening to Something Stupid by Frank and Nancy Sinatra, for instance, might transport one back to an age when one was stupid and had full use of one’s limbs. Chopin’s E Major etude might transport one to another age, when the tristesse of life was particularly acute. The smell of summer air, ascending the stairwell—or the smell of rain on a cold winter night, when moisture soaked through one’s sweater to reach the skin. As a rule, one must live life looking to the future. It does not do to dwell on the past. But there comes a point when it becomes apparent that there is little left of the future. At such times one may turn around and gaze upon the luxuriant garden of memories that one has cultivated through the years and allow oneself to sink into the rose bed of nostalgia as the eternal twilight dims one’s senses. Very soon the present and the future will cease to exist. What was will be all there is.