One thing many of us have learned is that even though we live our lives forward, we still can't help thinking about the past. Nostalgia is bittersweet, yet most of the time it's rewarding. Nostalgia can make us feel that our lives have roots and continuity. It can make us feel good about ourselves. It provides texture to our lives. After all, the past is just the present a few days, months or years later. Would we ever want to feel that today won't still be valuable tomorrow?
What I'm feeling nostalgic about now are winters past. I bet we all have fond winter memories from our childhood. During the months of November and December as each night grows longer, nostalgia is the perfect antidote to loneliness, boredom or anxiety. I love to share memories with my brother, and with my cousin. My husband and I have memories that go back to high school. Daily we recollect together. Sharing a memory is twice blessed. Even the sense of wistfulness and loss that accompanies the past can be enriching. Winter is a time for nostalgia.
My earliest winter memory is sleigh riding with my father. My mother must have been pregnant since my brother was born in midwinter, so it was my father who took me out after work in the early darkness to sled down a shallow hill. I was 4 years old. What's your first snow memory? Were you trained as I was trained to love snow?
Later, we neighborhood kids rode our belly-busters down steep icy streets lit by porch-lights and the occasional street light. We'd come in with frozen hair, mitts clotted with snow, and dump our gear on kitchen heat vents to dry before the next round of sledding. Friends would hang out together in sock-feet stretched out on the floor while someone's mother made hot chocolate.
On my husband's and my second date we took our sleds to a nearby golf course and by moonlight sailed down hill after hill until we were soaking wet and out of breath. I still remember the shadows the trees cast, holding hands in our thick mittens, and what a fun time we had. We got carry-out hamburgers and ate them in the car with the engine running. I was 15 and he was 16. The next morning, roads were impassable. St. Louis has hard winters. Years later, after marriage, we lived in Cleveland and went bobsledding. Winters there are even harder.
When our daughter was only three I pulled her up and down the Midwest country road in front of our parsonage in what felt like near-blizzard conditions. We both just needed to get out. She wore a red snowsuit and sang "The Twelve Days of Christmas" in her baby voice the whole time.
When they were grade schoolers, the children would pelt their father with snowballs as soon as he got home. They'd wait and plot for hours and he always responded with great surprise, "Oh no, you got me!" Our son's cocker spaniel would ride on the sled with him down the hill in front of our house and stay out 'till her fur was clumped with ice balls. She was a trooper.
Now my granddaughter and I take our rudderless sleds and saucers over to the neighbor's hill as soon as the flurries start. Here in the North Carolina Piedmont we're overjoyed with whatever sticks. She narrates videos of our mishaps.
Such a good time for memories and reflections, for taking what is good and trying to make it better. We need to be more generous in winter, to neighbors, friends and strangers. Even the birds need our help.
Of course a memory can be depressing. But for the most part nostalgia brings to mind cherished experiences that remind us we are valued and have had meaningful lives. Let's let the memories flow this winter. And feed the memory bank with new things every day. Something to look forward to. Nina Naomi
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