Re-visiting the Past - Wise or Not?

S

smiley

Senior Member
I admit I do it from time to time and then get bored - but I am jumping the gun a bit? I have visited my old alma matar on several occasions - in fact they have their own website which I rarely use atm? Recently as I mulled over the past and the wine I got to thinkin again - 20 yrs ago I had taken my new bride back to England from Oz for a holiday and showed her the old school.

There we met a couple of old guys yarning over a garden hedge. One was very cheerful and friendly and broke off his conversation and offered to take us home for tea? Where was this going I wonder. Well apart from exhuberance in all things we had a pleasant hr or two and promised to keep in touch. Which I did usually by mail ; occasionally phone and eventually he withered and died.

Just recently with the use of google earth etc and a few alma mater mates I tried to track down his "little lane and cottage" - impossible - may not even be successful if done physically on site. The empty countryside had just blossomed with housing estates etc etc - and the popn of UK risen by 20 million. For me it became a signal of not re-visiting the past at least not in body or even with google earth - just perhaps reserved for the mind??
 

smiley said:
For me it became a signal of not re-visiting the past at least not in body or even with google earth - just perhaps reserved for the mind??
Click to expand...
It's true, you truly can't go back again. I tried a few times over the years, but the physical and social environments of the past had totally changed and in each instance the effort was a letdown. I keep a few bits and bobs and some pictures to remind me of former times. It's enough. 🥲
 
someone explained to me recently that you can go over to U-tube and often find old videos of the towns and villages you once lived in - now that would be scary heh?? or perhaps NOT?
 

I love Google Earth because I can, and have, visited many of the places I used to live, across three continents.

I found the two places I lived my childhood till I left home, still standing. They’d been modernized some, but still completely recognizable.

We lived in California for some years, and at one point a few years ago when the family was visiting my oldest son, we went and looked at all the places we lived. My ex moved us around so much back then, there were several houses to see.

I enjoy revisiting the past in that way!
 
I experienced remorse after my retirement. Went back several times to visit. Things had changed. Old friends had passed. Frequent haunts had disappeared to modernization. I think it was the 3rd or 4th trip back when I came to realize the differences. Everything had evolved into something altogether different than what I remembered. I was at a loss that time with nowhere or no one familiar to visit. They had moved on, I hadn't. I drove home with the memory of what it once was, and not what it is now.. It's been 10 years since my last visit.
 
Last edited:
We revisited a few of the places where we used to live. I did not like the changes. The houses that we once owned, loved and put so much care into it were different, almost unrecognisable.
I did not like that feeling. I'd rather avoid going back and keep my memory of what once was.
 
I re=visited my home town in Indiana a couple times over the
years, really not much change, very small town with little to
draw one in....did find out thru google mapps or something
that the block/house I lived in is gone and replaced with some
sort of industrial buildings....
 
I am a member of several ancient forums of past lives - some I now ignore - because it's really just a game for the elderly sitting in a church hall in a circle discussing the past. It is nostalgic and can be very bitter? Usually the catch phrase is "" look wot they've done to it now it used to be so beautiful before""?
 
Rakaia said:
Thomas C Wolfe said, "You can't go home again"
As for the question of the wisdom of visiting the past, it's subjective and begs the question of why would you?
Click to expand...
I think many of us [No I have read accounts from many of us who wish to go home again] it's the reason why so many forums flourish for years talking about past lives and events. How many would want to compared to not - take a guess at percentage wise? you go first! Many of us long for that less technical time ; quiet more peaceful and most of all in most cases the absent family. Either moved or deceased?

The internet is littered with forums related to towns; cities and villages and people who 'want to go home again' and do in some cases. I have contacts on forums who go back regularly to visit their aging parents and any left friends - it is part of the human psyche for some of us?
 
The house and yard I grew up in was huge. In my tiny little mind, which was great for me. I had a great childhood.

I drove past the house 40 years later to show my young children where I grew up in California. I was SHOCKED at how small it was. I actually doubted for a second or two if I had made a mistake finding MY house. Nope it was it. Small, very small, hard to believe small.

Smaller everyday until it all disappears. :)
 
Used to be 'going back' was thinking about my salad days. High school, football, baseball, fishing, etc. One girl.

Now, 'going back' is thinking about pushing the kids around in a wheelbarrow all day while doing yardwork. I don't think I ever pushed an empty wheelbarrow when they were little. Dump the mulch, kids climb in for the free ride back to the driveway for another load.

Or the time it snowed so much I let them get on the roof to shovel it off. They were probably 13, and my wife was horrified, but they still talk about it every time it snows. I have the greatest picture they took of themselves on the roof, big, goofy braces-filled grins.

My most cherished 'going back', though, was bath time. My wife hated that chore, but to me, it was a joy I'll never forget. Having twins, she'd get them in, scrub them, get them out.

I, on the other hand would knee by the tub and we'd just play and splash and laugh. I'd draw dinosaurs and palm tree with the foam soap, and blow soap bubbles with our fingers. Or rub soap on the washchloth and blow a million bubbles that way. When the water started to get cold, they'd scooch up to one end of the tub so I could run hot water and add more bubble bath.

And we'd keep playing, all the while scrubbing toes and ears and backs, and making their hair stand up straight in spikes.

Eventually, though, bath time would be over. My shirt and jeans would be soaked. But, play time wasn't over. Not by a long shot. I'd spend the next 1/2 hour rolling them up tight in towels and spinning them out really fast on to the bed. They sheer happiness of those high pitched squeals and laughter. Man, I miss that.

Sorry. Didn't mean to get so sentimental, but those memories are so vivid, and from such a happy time.
 
I visit a site connected to my final school days/early courting days - I know one guy died in Canada in a car crash - sad once a close friend. never come across any others I knew but I was rather shy and withdrawn in those times? They had a physical reunion few months back - didn't make it or wanted to - all seems a bit pointless ; {back slapping shoulder hugging and what have you been up to event] seems a bit meaningless? school reunions - what fgs??
 
Yes and yes and yes again! - i have the fortune or misfortune to have a dedicated website just for the village in which I once lived. I will not name it to protect the innocents!! - It had been designed and maintained by a dear lady who had lived in the village all her life I believe and at some point she had explained what stimulated her to produce it. It is only a village of 6,000 but as you can imagine still holds many memories for me. I first shed eyes on it in my early teens and left in my late teens - my mother was heartbroken and after leaving uk I never met her again?

Since leaving the village I have since spoken to only two of my former mates NO tell a lie three, not verbally in writing - one has since died and another approaching it. So now I never visit much ; as neither does most others who have left. There is a much more exciting newsletter issued by the local council to all households in the village that keeps them updated but I doubt little exchange of chatter? So this website sits there ; moribund holding hundreds of memory messages and I have read most as do many other sites in the world - a galaxy of non- functioning websites which may never decay? Wots the point ?Alfie??
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top