Ask me if I ever go through a period of not feeling nostalgic.
To choose an image, it seems as if there were a steady current running from the present into the past, a sort of mental-emotional extension cord, that causes various areas of the past to light up according to which buttons I touch in the present—even if I just brush against them accidentally. There is always something lit up.
I’m not sure this is just a symptom of my senior status, either. I think those connections have always been strong to me, even when I was quite young. To me they’re all tied up with identity and the feeling that your history is your anchor in time and place.
This doesn’t mean that I’m absent in the present moment but only that I’m very aware of connections, correlations, and continuities. I don’t think I’ll ever be the Zen frog on a lily pad.
@Mama_Cakes, are you by any chance approaching a milestone birthday or some sort of life transition?