Tanvi Vidyala, Week 16: Keeping Track of Memories

 

I generally steer away from my own personal experiences in blogs. Something about people telling me that once I start on talking about my experiences I usually spiral into a rant about something entirely different. Though since this is the last blog post for this class, I might as well, right?

 I always used to call nostalgia a useless emotion. But I ended up writing a blog last quarter on the psychological reasons as to why it exists. See, nostalgia makes you sad and makes you feel like there’s no time you’d rather be in but now. But I’d like to think that reminiscing is what gives things its meaning. If we go through life without reflecting on what happened, things seem to go by too fast and eventually become too blurry in our memories. Sometimes a little sadness is good for the mind. If you’ve ever watched the movie Inside Out you’d know what I mean.
This last weekend, in a haze of nostalgic yearning, I looked through an app called Google Keep that I would write short diary entries and notes into throughout seventh through tenth grade. In hindsight I find them very pretentious, especially the ones written in seventh and eighth grade. I would try to use convoluted vocabulary and meaningless expressions to describe simple things like “I miss being younger.” Of course as pretentious as it seems now, writing in that style gave me a way to practice writing outside of class. I love writing, especially in ways that mirror self-reflection to this day. 

When I looked at the ninth and tenth grade diary entries, I couldn’t help but laugh at how silly some of them were to me now. I talked about friends and people that I couldn’t fathom having in my life now. Though all of it was from a year or two ago, it seemed so childish. These last two years have been insane in the sense that time has been moving so quickly, yet it feels like it hasn’t been moving at all. Before quarantine we were all freshmen, new and unfamiliar with the high school experience. A common phrase I’ve said this year was that I still felt like I was “mentally a freshman,” but having a record of the thoughts and feelings my fourteen-year-old self had has proven me wrong. 

Even if these two years have really felt like nothing to me, I certainly have changed a lot more than I thought I did. Two years ago I wanted to be a software engineer, do track, and had dreams of being an award winning speaker. Now I want to go into a more neuroscience-oriented field, don’t want anything to do with sports, and still can’t speak for the life of me (the last two aren’t a flex, but I’m just saying). I use the app Notion instead of Google Keep to keep track of my memories. 

However some things are still consistent. My ninth grade friend group may have shattered into pieces towards the start of quarantine, but many of the people in it are still in my life. I got to finish ninth grade me’s mission to perform in the musical Freaky Friday, and get to use my love of music for something greater than my own interests. I watched the newest season of Stranger Things with the same enthusiasm as my rising ninth grade self watched it the summer before high school.

Reflection through mediums such as art or writing can give our memories meaning and teaches us many profound lessons. For that I’m glad I’m a nostalgic person and I hope to write more cringy diary entries going forward for myself to find in three years and laugh at.