No Stalgia

I'm dealing with the fact that I'm nostalgic for so many thing, these days. I... I'm finding out so much right now that I want to go back in time and either redo or relive so many different times and experiences. Many people wish this, but most of the time it is understood that people want to go back in time and relive things with what they know now, so they can change things or alter the course of their history.

I just want to relive them the way I did.

I'm finding things from my first year here at Drake. I'm thinking about things I did in the summer between educational aspects of my life. I'm remembering events from high school. I'm viewing things from my childhood.

I was in a car with two of my friends talking about the old Nintendo game, Mike Tyson's Punch-Out! and wishing I was playing it. Why? I would get bored with it in a few seconds, or I would beat my old records to a pulp. Chances are good that one or the other would happen. But I want to cling to the past so much anymore that the present merely seems to be a blur of the now mixed with desires for the then.

I'm watching these old Sonic the Hedgehog cartoons on DVD, borrowed from one of the friends mentioned above. These used to run on ABC on Saturday mornings and were darker in themes and tone and content. There was talk of people dying and things were not ever so great for the characters.

I remember watching that show, watching it every morning. I remember a "thrilling" two-part episode where the characters went back in time and how I'd taped the first one and watched it with my father and then had to wait to see the second half with him because he was excited for it as well (although, looking back, it could have merely been because he just wanted to spend the time with me, not so much for the story... but as a child, it was great knowing he was as invested as I was). Then I remember the final episode and how much of a cliffhanger it was and how much more I wanted.

Then I remember waiting and waiting for the new episodes. Eventually, the waiting became growing up, and the show was gone.

Watching these DVDs, though, I'm sensing small parts of myself and my love for these characters. Sure, now the animation is pretty crummy and the writing is lackluster ("How fast were we going, Sonic?" "We were rootin' and scootin!" "Really? Rootin' and scootin'?") but the themes are still there. The sense of urgency and survival paired with mild frivolity. I miss that.

I never know what I want. I never know whats going on (anymore). All I really know is that some days... being in the present only makes me yearn for the past.

Yeah.