You may not know it to look at me, but I’m pretty anal. I recently went through a pile of photographs dating back to junior high and arranged them chronologically. I then dove headlong into a stack of our theatre company‘s reviews and organized them by production, then subdivided them alphabetically by media source. And last night at 10pm, knowing that my car was running on empty and that I’ve got traveling to do later this week, I put on some shorts and schlepped to the gas station for a fill-up.
But that’s not why I’m writing.
Driving home last night, I was listening to the radio, and I heard this song…. I don’t know who wrote it, and ultimately it doesn’t matter: what’s important is the feeling it evoked. It had a dreamy, soothing, Cocteau Twins kind of sound–the very sound I found so engaging when I first became fascinated with New Orleans a decade and a half ago. Back then, I’d drive into the city with friends, and we’d cruise up and down St. Charles Avenue, windows open to the humid night air, listening to gauzy alterna-rock. I wouldn’t say that those were golden days or even that they were carefree; in fact, it was a fairly difficult time for me, trying to reconcile my (somewhat) straight frat rat facade with my evolving awareness that I really, really like to kiss boys. It was, however, a memorable time in my life–one filled with rituals and comfortable routines.
Last night, it wasn’t just the music that struck me: the song coming from the radio, the time of night, the temperature of the air, all combined to effect a flash of recognition and remembrance. Every so often this happens, like an intense physical/emotional recall, and for a split second, I’m Uptown, hanging out with an early crush. Or I’m back in junior high, on my first day at a strange, new school. It’s a fleeting experience, and try as I might, I can never hang on to it for very long.
Let me reiterate: what I felt last night was not some smarmy, wistful, weepy-eyed, Bruce Springsteen-inspired “glory days” moment. It was not nostalgia. Nostalgia is a warm and fuzzy thing–literally translated, nostalgia is “a returning home.” This was not that. This was the shock of the deja vu, as disorienting as time-travel. This was visceral and breathtaking and significant and disturbing. This was reliving, not remembering.
sturtle [dot] com 