Nostalgia is a bitch, and I’ll tell you why.
We spend so much energy trying to recapture moments that are gone. They’re done. They ain’t gonna happen again.
And that’s okay.
Open the photo album. Put on the record. Remember the glory days. Let the nostalgia wash over you. The problem starts when we spend so much time looking in the rear-view mirror waiting for an opportunity to make a U-turn that we forget to watch the road ahead. We run a red light, almost get T-boned, eventually rear-end a police car, then blame the accident on the fact that things aren’t the way they used to be.
But were they really that great?
I grew up in the 80s. Dudes wore crop tops and I had that business-up-front, party-in-the-back haircut. Sure, they were “simpler times.”
Every generation says that.
In the 80s, we were already nostalgic for the 50s. It was everywhere. Television, movies, music, cars. Happy Days was still on television. Billy Idol was taking sounds from early rock and roll and smashing them into something new. Mr. Miyagi had Daniel waxing a collection of beautiful old cars while teaching him karate.
We were nostalgic for the past while living through the period we’re nostalgic for now.
And to quote one of the most underrated films of all time, Hot Tub Time Machine:
“We had Reagan and AIDS.”
That pretty much sums it up.
We remember the music, the arcades and riding our bikes until the streetlights came on. We forget the parts that weren’t so wonderful.
Take medicine alone. We’ve made extraordinary advances in a single generation. Nobody is jumping into a DeLorean to go get their cancer treated in 1985.
That’s the thing about our fantasy of going back. We want 1985, but we’d like to bring 2026 with us.
We want the records, but we want Spotify too.
I like putting a record on a turntable as much as anyone. Hell, I’m one of the last people with cable and I’ll still flip through the channels just to see what’s on. We can argue about whether subscription models and algorithms have made entertainment better or worse.
But do we really want to give up the internet? Laptops? Cell phones?
If you woke up tomorrow and suddenly found yourself transported back to 1983, I guarantee the first thing you’d do is reach into your pocket and ask Siri what the hell is going on.
Then you’d realize there’s nothing in your pocket.
So you’d find a payphone.
Then realize you don’t have a quarter.
Then realize you don’t know anybody’s fucking phone number.
Welcome to the glory days.
And technology isn’t the only thing we conveniently edit out.
I grew up during a remarkably progressive era, but the battles hadn’t been won. To pretend otherwise is ignorant at best.
I remember standing on picket lines with my mother while nurses fought for pay equity. For those too young to remember the term, the fight was about addressing the systemic undervaluing of work traditionally done by women.
They had to fight for that.
Today everybody complains about “wokeness.” And sure, some ideas being pushed today seem extreme to me too. We should be able to argue about them.
But back in the day we called it “political correctness.”
And people complained about it then exactly the way they complain about wokeness now.
“You can’t say anything anymore.”
“Everybody’s too sensitive.”
“I’m afraid I’m going to offend somebody.”
Political correctness pushed us to reconsider language and behaviour around race, women and other groups. But the boundaries of acceptable cruelty were still much wider. Gay people could be openly mocked in ways mainstream society largely accepted. Trans people were routinely treated as punchlines.
That’s the time you want to go back to?
Because here’s something nostalgia conveniently forgets:
The person telling the joke and the person who was the joke may remember the exact same decade very differently.
Maybe the past wasn’t actually better.
Maybe we were just younger.
Of course life seemed simpler when somebody else paid the mortgage. We weren’t worrying about our parents getting older, our bodies changing, careers, retirement or whatever fresh disaster appeared in the morning news.
We were ten.
The adults weren’t having nearly as carefree a time as we remember having.
None of this means we should stop being nostalgic.
Quite the opposite.
Open the photo album.
Remember the people. Remember the music. Remember that ridiculous haircut. Remember the summer nights that seemed like they’d last forever.
Let it wash over you.
Then let it charge you.
Because the purpose of remembering a life well lived shouldn’t be convincing yourself that the best part of it is over.
It should make you want to create more days worth remembering.
The rear-view mirror is there for a reason. Look into it once in a while. Remember where you’ve been. Smile at everything disappearing behind you.
Then put your eyes back on the road.
We’ve got problems in front of us that need solving. We’ve got places we haven’t been yet. And if we’re lucky, twenty years from now we’ll glance into that rear-view mirror and today will give us the same warm feeling yesterday does now.
Nostalgia isn’t the problem.
Just don’t let it drive the fucking car.