A trip down memory lane- The power of nostalgia.

Musings of Kattumaram rides & hot summer days

It was a hot, sunny day. We were wearing flip-flops and play clothes. Nearly all morning, we had spent running around in the garden, playing hide-and-seek, inventing games, and eating ripe mangoes. Every so often, we could come inside and take respite from the blazing sun with glasses of cold, sweet lime juice.

The long summer days never seemed to end, and we were always able to find fun things to do. Looking back now, I do not remember the games, but I do remember the feeling. They were some of the best days of my life.

When I look back at that season, I can feel the summer sun on my face, taste the mango and coconut on my lips, and remember sweaty fingers belonging to me and my cousins as we played for hours. Nostalgia, at times, feels like the real thing.

During the first week of January 2025, I was on a flight travelling back to the United States after spending a week in India. This trip had been one of mixed emotions and complicated feelings. And as the flight took off over my hometown of Chennai, I did not know how to feel. I looked forward to returning home, but I was also leaving home, at least parts of it that always felt like it—people that I love, familiar places, memories that were made. Leaving was always so complicated and exhausting.

Nostalgia is a funny thing. Merriam-Webster defines Nostalgia “as a wistful or excessively sentimental yearning for return to or of some past period or irrecoverable condition.”

I have nothing against the definition, but I prefer how Michael Chabon, in his essay The True Meaning of Nostalgia for The New Yorker, defines it.

Chabon defines Nostalgia as “most truly and most meaningfully, the emotional experience—always momentary, always fragile—of having what you lost or never had, of seeing what you missed seeing, of meeting the people you missed knowing, of sipping coffee in the storied cafés that are now yoga studios. It’s the feeling that overcomes you when some minor vanished beauty of the world is momentarily restored. In that moment, you are connected; you have placed a phone call directly into the past and heard an answering voice.”

We often criticize those who seem overly nostalgic for a world that is not how it used to be. Humans don’t like change, even if it is the only constant in life. Nostalgia is even viewed as weakness or fragility, the inability to be strong in the face of change.

But I would wager that nostalgia allows us to tap into the recesses of our brains, find memories that have been hidden for ages, and see today what we missed seeing then because that is what we do. We don’t see enough, we don’t linger enough, and we rush through life in a frenzy, squeezing as much efficiency as we possibly can and holding onto control as much as we can. And as Chabon says, if we can see the beauty we missed, hear the laugh we took for granted, and hear the voice at the other end of the call when we least expected it, perhaps looking back in nostalgia is not all bad.

On those hot summer days, one memory lingers strongly in my head. I remember walking a long way. My skinny brown legs at the age of 11 in flip flops were not strong enough to walk on scorching tar roads. It was early afternoon, and most of the homes on the street were quiet. Everyone had had their afternoon meal, and the summer days called for a siesta. The dogs lay panting on the street, and for a few hours every afternoon, the town would be calm. We were a group of about 8, a bunch of kids ranging in age from 8-12 commandeered by two older, college-aged cousins. We looked up to them in awe. College seemed so far away, and they were so grown up.

We walked through the side streets and crossed the narrow path between the road and the walls of the great white Cathedral. The sea sand was hot beneath my feet and soft, covering my toes as I stepped into it. The fishermen lay resting near their boats after a morning of busy activity. We could see the fishing Katturmarams lying on their side. My older cousins approached the fishermen and asked if they would take us out for a boat ride. The opportunity to get into a fishing boat on a hot summer day in the middle of the Bay of Bengal when our parents were not around was an adventure not to be missed. Somewhere in our minds, most of us had forgotten that we could not swim.

So we clambered onto the thin wooden boats that felt like they would sink as four of us climbed into one and the rest into another. The cool water of the ocean was like balm to our scorched skin. Grasping the edge of the boat for dear life, away we went deep into the Bay. Flip flops were forgotten on the shore, and I could taste the salt on my lips from the spray of the waves. The water was every shade of blue I had ever seen, and I could not see the bottom. I knew we had gone in deep, but the excitement, joy, and thrill were everything any of us could have wanted that day. At that moment, we surrendered to the ocean, her waves, and the rhythm of buoying along. The boat would be safe, and my cousins, I knew, would keep me safe. Fear was forgotten. Some of the fishermen and my older cousins hopped into the ocean to swim along for a while. I can never remember how long we were on the boat, but I suppose someone had the sense to turn around and bring us back in. Perhaps it was one of the fishermen. Maybe he knew that these excited children could not swim and he did not want an accidental drowning on his hands.

Coming back to shore was cathartic. The sun soon dried our wet clothes, and we trudged back home, our skin streaked with salt and sand.

I cannot remember what happened the rest of that summer. But till today, we have been talking and laughing about the Kattumaram story. There isn’t a single trip to India where my cousins and I do not reminisce about that day. I found out much later that our college-aged cousins got thrashed by their parents for taking the younger ones on the boats. With our lack of swimming knowledge and not having told the parents where we were going, this little trip could have been a disaster, but we all lived to tell the tale.

Whenever I close my eyes and remember this story, the cool ocean waters flow over me. I smile as I feel the sun on my face and am thankful for nostalgia—for its gift. It helps me remember. At that moment, the beauty and joy I experienced that day come back vividly, living in my memories in full technicolor.

Having lived outside of India for most of my life, making many memories with my cousins and extended family has been difficult. But these are the ties that bind us. Living here and traveling there will always be complicated, so moments of nostalgia help, and I am grateful.

Photo by Jerry Zechariah on Unsplash