Yearning to Return
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“The Greek word for "return" is nostos. Algos means "suffering." So nostalgia (nostos-algos) is the suffering caused by an unappeased yearning to return.”
― Milan Kundera
You know the return you relish – the one gets you back to that Thai restaurant with the memorable peanut sauce, or to that charming bed and breakfast on the lake or back to hear that band one more time.
You’re also likely to know the reluctant return - that family reunion with the difficult relative, going back to the gym or seeing an ex.
Yet here’s something I’ve discovered: Whether we choose the returning or the returning chooses us, we yearn to return.
Returning is also the thing that most often brings people to the page to write a difficult story from their life.
I like to think of it as an invitation that we can accept or decline. When we accept, we are agreeing to set out on a journey without a map. We’re writing as we go.
Challenging, yes. But worth the effort.
Because even though it’s a returning, it’s forward moving. A step toward a better understanding. Whether it’s reading old letters and going through photo albums or traveling by car, train, bus, Uber or plane to a place where something happened, in all cases you are arriving once again, making the experience with your Now Self.
Writing my memoir demanded that I make a series of returns. The first, to my twentieth high school reunion, was the easiest. I relished that one. But it was followed by a succession of reluctant ones: going to the accident intersection to take photographs, digging around in old letters and albums and and sitting down to interview my parents and best friends.
But these ultimately led to a long overdue conversation with the friend with whom I shared the experience that would ultimately gift both of us with clarity and healing.
Going back to something difficult is tough. But when the memory or the place or the people call or tug or pull, there’s something there for you to claim or perhaps more importantly, to discover.
Photo by EBB
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