Nostalgia

 One thing that moving across the country has brought me is occasional powerful nostalgia.

At the age of 27, I can by no means claim to be old or associate myself with anything that involves complaining about age. Yet, I find myself being drawn to influences from the past in ways that I've never experienced. 

In North Dakota, I was close to all of my experiences. I would smell fall and physically prepare for cross country; I would feel fall and emotionally prepare for hunting season; I would see fall and mentally prepare for the brutality of winter. None of that is necessarily nostalgia, and for some reason my experiences in middle and high school did not feel as powerful in college as my experiences in high school and college have felt in adulthood. Heck, the only thing I remember from middle school is riding the packed Horace bus and laughing while Chris Krick forgot he was inside and spit a lougie on the carpet while we were all walking late to class, because our bus was never on time. 

Ahhhh, memories. 

But memories are different than emotional longings for what was. Recently, I started listening to the song "Free" by Rudimental (the Cash Cash X Gazzo Remix) and I had to stop early because I was developing intense feelings, include goosebumps, and almost had some water welling up in my eyes. I stared down at my phone, shocked at the images that just flashed across my mind. This song had transported me back to a lonely gravel road in western North Dakota, where I relied on my iPod to get me through unreasonably harsh North Dakota weather. I remembered jamming to this song, pumping my fists in the dry air, while rehearsing my lines out loud, because I had to perform as Jesus in our Faith Walk later that evening. This song had been one of my favorites for a long period of time, and it had been years since I had last heard it.* Somehow, this song had infused what seemed like simple music into my emotions and created something powerful. It reminded me of the movie "Inside Out", where the fusion of core memories is what allowed the main character to grow and mature. 

I haven't listened to the song since. There's something about that song that almost scares me, because it affected me differently than any other song. I have music that makes me almost drive off the road because I'm so fired up, and I have music that can lull me into homework mode for hours at a time, but few other things can transport me back to a seemingly past life. 

One thing I've been doing a lot of here in Virginia is cleaning. No, not dishes and sweeping cleaning (I do a lot of that, too), but de-cluttering cleaning. Both in my family and other families, many folks have a tendency to hang on to things, not for their financial value, but their sentimental value. That spoon reminds them of an international journey, that dress reminds her of that friend's wedding, that book reminds him of his father. We attach ourselves emotionally to things that serve as memory-inducers, because we are afraid to forget. I, for one, am especially guilty of this, because one of things I do with this blog is document my experiences to help me remember what I've gone through, in terms of running. 

Runners do this, too. Many runners will keep racing bibs, despite having little-to-no financial value. Each number is a memory of a race, place, time, and/or friends. We hang on to shoes as a reminder of the miles that it took to destroy their rubbery fabric. We refuse to throw away shirts picked up at racing events, no matter how battered they may be. We all know that nobody will check the results in the future, and that place and time don't matter at all in the long-term (unless you're an Olympian, but odds are that you aren't if you're reading a North Dakota Running Blog). 

What do we do with nostalgia? Do we let it consume us and affect our day-to-day life? Do we ignore it as something in the past? In a nutrition class in college, I learned that 75-80% of our enjoyment in a certain food comes from the first bite, and then there's diminishing returns after that; this is why simply eating more of something doesn't really make you feel better or bring your more pleasure. When a powerful memory hits as the result of an old letter, song, sound, view, etc, it's beneficial to swim in it for awhile, letting the memories flow through you like waves on the beach, or like that first bite of something delicious. Eventually you need to exit the water, dry off, and move onto the next thing. The waves will be there, but there's no harm in waving good-bye and coming back at another point. The cool (but also scary) thing about nostalgia is that sometimes you don't know when it'll hit. 

A few weeks ago someone asked me why I like listening to the Minnesota Twins on the radio while I do my school work. I realized that it brought me a sense of comfort, because during it I was transported back to high school Nate, sitting in front of the TV, bowl of ice cream in hand, in the stuffy and warm upstairs as the heat of a summer's day breathed out of the ground. Since that time, I've went to college, ran track/xc, taught on a Reservation, worked 10 summers at a Bible Camp, been married, travelled to almost every state in the country, and moved to a different time zone and climate. And yet, I can still remember Johan Santana's changeup and Nick Punto's gold-glove defense like it was yesterday. 

I haven't yet found a song that triggers a MN Twins memory, but I also didn't grind hundreds of miles on a gravel road while listening to baseball. I don't know in the future what will trigger my memories of Virginia, but I know that I'll hang on the them, let them go, and ask them to come back and visit sometime, because they'll always be welcome here. 

I'm gonna go listen to that song now. 

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*Well, I had heard it once a few months ago while running, and I also got goosebumps and audibly smiled while running.