Nostalgia and What Happens After

As summer ends, we can feel that time has a life of its own

Looking out at the road rushing under my wheels
Looking back at the years gone by like so many summer fields

Running on Empty, Jackson Browne

Field of Dreams

Nostalgia. The word is rooted in the Greek “return home” and “pain,” but personally I don’t experience it as pain only, I experience it as a simultaneous longing and tasting. As if I didn’t know I was so hungry and only one bite of a delicious meal sits before me. What I have and don’t have lingers in the air. It’s wonderful and awesome and heartbreaking.

Summer is not my favorite season, but my sense of nostalgia is often strong in summer. The humidity of St. Louis is oppressive and makes a person move slower. Maybe it’s the slow pace that allows room for it.

This summer feeling, I share with lots of people. I think of the layers of nostalgia in the Field of Dreams game that took place earlier this month. What American sport is more nostalgic than baseball? What movie illuminates our nostalgia for simple times, purpose, past, and a sense of going home more than Field of Dreams?