***

For as long as I can remember,

Whenever I looked back on a time in my life, or looked back on my life as a whole,

I often did so in the context of how I may tell that story were I to ever be interviewed about it.

Hardships, relationships, successes;

I’ve always worked through and processed them under the guise of sitting in a chair across from someone, and having them ask me about it.

Whether it be for a magazine article, or for a TV special,

I’d find myself forming sentences in my head on how I’d answer a range of question about those moments;

Why I did the things I did. What hardships I had since learned to appreciate. How I’d grown and changed along the way.

And whether it be some form of grandiose narcissism, or simply comes from being an avid consumer of media with a journalism degree,

It always seemed to help me work through things, and process them in the most concise, and thought-out sound-bites.

*

With that said,

I found myself recently down the street from my childhood home,

I place I hadn’t visited in eleven years.

I moved out of home the exact same day that my parents sold the house,

And hadn’t been back to the house, let alone the suburb, since.

And so – in my own typical fashion,

Under the grand-delusion that I was in my Jennifer Lopez era, doing a tour of my hometown for a segment on 60 Minutes,

With my own personal Anderson Cooper by my side,

I took a stroll down my street,

And subsequently, I took a stroll down memory lane too.

*

Leaving that house as a twenty-two year old, and returning now well into my thirties,

With a broad list of new life experiences, hopes, desires, even a new name under my belt,

Being there felt all at once so familiar,

Yet also completely foreign.

Far beyond the dilapidated front fence that now stood at the boundary I once knew,

And the overgrown tree that obscured the view of my childhood bedroom window,

Once I was there, I realised that this was no longer the same place I had known throughout my childhood,

No matter how much I wished it could be.

*

More than knowing that the surrounding houses that once been home to my closest friends had either been sold off, or pulled down.

More than knowing that the primary school across the road, where I spent those seven formative years of my life, no longer contained the classrooms where my artwork once adorned the walls.

Being there, on that day, years on, told me everything I needed to know;

This wasn’t the street I once knew,

This wasn’t the house I once knew,

And, it was then that I realised, that nor was I.

*

I know myself now to be someone who is both extremely nostalgic,

Whilst also being someone who blocks out a lot of his past.

Often remembering with profound fondness, the most simple and joyous of memories from throughout my life,

Whilst simultaneously shutting out a lot of the harder times that came along too.

Actively choosing not to think about those times that perhaps shaped me in a more negative sense,

Or having a mind that does the blocking for me;

Choosing to bury those traumas deep in my mind, out of sight, as a form of protection.

I love to focus on all the very best of the memories I am fortunate enough to have,

And push away the times I’d rather forget –

Until, of course, those memories come and bust that door down,

Demanding to be heard and remembered.

*

After driving off that day,

And for a few days afterwards,

I found myself spending more and more time thinking about the person I was when I lived there,

And I couldn’t help but compare him to the person I am today.

I wondered if where I am now, and who I am now,

Was I happier than when I lived here ten-fifteen years ago?

Was I better off?

Of course there is a far greater sense of calm and belonging that comes from living a far more authentic life these days,

Living my truth compared to the nineteen years I did in hiding whilst in that house,

But there is also the fact that the boy that lived there hadn’t yet faced a lot of the traumas that were to come in his adult life.

He undoubtedly had a more sheltered existence,

Having not yet bore witness to the inevitable sadnesses of life,

And the dips in the faith of humanity that come with thirty years on the planet.

And yet in the twenty-two years he spent there,

He had encountered a whole world of his own traumas too,

And it would be remiss of me to ever water down his own experiences.

To pretend that the trials and tribulations of a young person growing up then was anything less than an enormous test of faith and perseverance for his young mind and will –

To say that he ever had it easy, based solely on the comparison of what was to come in his life,

Is to do an enormous disservice to the boy that grew,

The boy that survived,

And the boy that then left that house.

*

I miss that kid a lot,

Oftentimes I find myself missing being him.

He seemed a little less burdened,

He seemed more joyful,

And he could fit into a Size 28 pant.

But I learned a phrase recently that turned that kind of thinking on its head:

Nostalgia is memory minus anxiety

– BJ Novak

So if, looking back, he seemed less burdened;

Perhaps he was just unaware.

In the rear-view mirror I see him in, he may seem more joyful,

But his life faced the usual gamut of ups and downs that everyone does,

With the later years there being clouded by the fear of his ‘one big secret’.

The good times I love to spend reflecting on were no less incredible,

But they came with bad times dotted between them too.

And as for the pant size –

Well, I’ll give him that. He could fit into those quite nicely.

*

But by being back, and by thinking back,

It made me rethink so much of who that boy was while living there,

And all that has happened since the last time that I closed and locked that front wire door.

And I have such extreme fondness for who that boy was.

I know that there’s nothing but undying love in my heart for that kid,

My heart often aches for him,

Knowing the mistakes he is yet to make,

And the mountains to come that he will have to climb alone.

But there is a true love I have for him that encompasses all of his faults and flaws.

Not a conditional love that seeks to airbrush them out, under the guise that he was ever perfect.

And standing at his front fence,

It gave me cause to stand still for a moment,

And look back on him, with affection,

After years of seeking to only strive ever-forward,

As far away as I could from him.

To focus on what was next,

What was to come.

Only to end up finding myself looking back,

And wondering if I should have enjoyed the view while I had it.

*

When I walked down that street,

Or would it be more poetic to say, ‘When I walked down that road’?

I realised that we can all look back longingly on a past home,

A past life,

A past feeling.

And want to be transported back there.

But much like living in a fantasy,

We can sometimes trap ourselves in the reminiscing,

Getting ourselves so stuck in a place that is no longer real,

That we unknowingly rose-tint moments from our past,

Believing that they were better than they were,

That we were happier than we were,

Or that life would be better if we could only find our way back there.

*

For some days afterwards, I was stuck in the thinking that life was undoubtedly better when I lived in that house,

Thinking that house held someone that was living a life better than I am now.

But I know, deep-down, he wasn’t,

That his life wasn’t a picture perfect story,

And whilst it also isn’t now –

Since ‘perfect’ is an impossible dream,

To ignore the journey he has been on since he lived there,

Is to do a disservice to the work he has done,

And the new loves, friends and family that he has accumulated by leaving there,

And growing.

*

It can be easy to slip back into nostalgia,

And find ourselves getting stuck there.

Ruminating over what has happened,

Longing for those feelings of the past to return to us.

But our memories, while treasured, aren’t reality anymore.

They have been redrawn and rewritten again and again,

And while the joy, comfort and importance they hold for us is real,

Trying to return to them is impossible.

And any effort to bring the past into the present is futile,

And will only serve to make our present feel insufficient.

So instead, we can take those memories,

Love them,

Cherish them,

Hold them close to our chest,

And store them somewhere safe.

In a box that we can return to,

Every once in a while,

To flick through,

And allow them to bring us the joy that only great memories can.

*

Consequently,

We can also find ourselves stuck in the bad times of the past,

Ruminating on demons and traumas,

Attaching them to who we are,

Rather than who we were,

And permitting them to continue burdening us for far longer than they should.

Holding onto sadness,

Anger,

Grief.

Allowing the traumas of our past to dictate our now and our future.

But if we can think on the good times of our past and also leave them there without bringing them into the present, why shouldn’t we be able to do the same with the bad times?

Our pasts are important;

They have shaped who we are,

And taught us each of the important lessons we’ve learned.

But getting stuck there will only take away our ability to live in the now,

And make memories that we’ll look back on.

Memories of meaning, of joy, and of endless laughter,

And those will become the ones that will warm the darker days in our future.

It’s always fun to return home,

For a moment.

Back to the place that houses all those formative memories,

Of childhood innocence, of growth, and of change –

But we don’t live there anymore,

And we never can again.

We’ve got a whole, real life existing at our feet right now,

Waiting for us to kick it up a gear.

And while we may occasionally look back and wonder,

‘What if?’,

We can too, look forward, with the childlike sense of wonder and possibility we once possessed, and say,

‘What now?’

***