- Elicit
I seem to experience intense feelings of nostalgia rather frequently in my everyday life. It’s brought on by the simplest or mundane of things, like the way the sun hits the top of conifers in the morning or evening, the trilling of a bird in the distance during certain seasons or weather conditions, the way a wall clock ticks away steadily in the stillness of my home (especially when accompanied by motes of dust in the sunlight), or the smell of a running air conditioner.
These moments illicit elicit both mysterious and beautiful emotions, but are hurled at me constantly. While I enjoy the feelings they give me, I seem to experience them far more often than I think most would consider normal. I don’t know if there is a term for this sense of hyper-nostalgia, or what (if anything) it’s indicative of. Most of it is tied to insignificant moments from my childhood, like lying in the melting snow on a Spring day (the trilling bird), or sitting bored in the car waiting on my mother (the sun on conifers), but a lot of it is more ambiguous.
So I thought it would be fun to ask other people what their strongest (and perhaps recurring) moments of nostalgia are triggered and/or tied to. What are some of yours?
Grilled chicken with mashed potatoes and sauerkraut. In my early teenage years when my mom was in the hospital for a long time and my dad had to work the second shift it was on my to cook dinner for me and my sister. More times than not I chose to grill a chicken in the oven and make instant mashed potatoes and add some sauerkraut on the side so we would have some vegetables on the plate too.
The chicken was great, the instant mashed potatoes and uncooked sauerkraut were terrible. Now when I do it though I make mashed potatoes from fresh potatoes with milk and butter and I cook the sauerkraut so it becomes nice and smooth.
Oh, one more thing, the smell of gasoline.
I lived as a teenager in a village and could finally be free to go anywhere I want when I got my moped drivers license. With that I had to start putting in gas into it and now the smell of gasoline smells like freedom to me.
Instant mash itself is a nice one for me. I never had it as a kid, but in my late school/early uni days when I had moved out, I discovered it.
Good times. Hard, but good.