Yesterday

I recently felt a wave of nostalgia for our home in Leander. 

Leander

We moved to the lake two years ago. After my mother in law Mildred, moved out, it made no sense to maintain a house already too big even for the three of us. But I loved that house. Probably because it reminded me of the house I grew up in. It was a big rambling red brick house with six bedrooms. The red brick and the number of bedrooms was a link between the two. 

Dublin

The house in Dublin was actually a five bedroom home, my parents had one of the very large bedrooms partitioned to make two smaller rooms. We were a large family. The house in Leander was a six bedroom home and we knocked two bedrooms into one to form an upstairs master suite by incorporating an existing bathroom into the new bedroom. It worked well. Mildred had the original master suite on the ground floor.

The nostalgia started with a memory of the few times we, Larry and I, slipped out in the middle of a Saturday afternoon and had a drink sitting at the bar less than a mile from the house. It was one of the very rare occasions when we got to be alone together and just talk. As mentioned before, Mildred was normally with us wherever we went. At the time I did enjoy the break from the normal, just the two of us relaxing and the feeling of some stolen moments of enjoyment. I didn't consider that we were creating memories. Looking back, I feel I didn't enjoy the moment as much as I should have. I didn't consider that it was something I would feel nostalgic about. I suppose the COVID restrictions make it that bit more nostalgic.

Of course, we are all constantly looking over our shoulders at the past, or forward into the future. Always missing the here and now, soon to become another memory of a moment not fully appreciated at the time.

I made a mental note to try to enjoy the present in the knowledge that it would soon be a past memory. Almost immediately I caught myself once again looking backwards to summer fishing and boating; and forwards to next summer, wishing away the present. 

Looking back on the past with nostalgia or with regret. Worrying about what might never happen in the future. These are just ways to miss what is happening in the present. 

This is going to take some practice but I plan to try to enjoy the moment as it is happening.