Why Do I Still Miss My Old Life?

I’m bewildered by my nostalgia that refuses to diminish with time

I was weirdly sad yesterday. My sadness kept leading me back to 2010, when my partner and I were in the early months of living together. (My god, has it been so long???)

I often return to that time and miss it intensely. Why? I’m not entirely sure. Much in part, I suspect, because I thought I had “figured everything out.” I thought my life was secure and on track and everything was going to be okay. I thought my partner was about to propose and I was drunk on dreams of motherhood and domestic bliss.

I was a young maid of 34, though at the time, it felt like I had waited for so long to get what I had dreamed of. All my friends had been married and popping out kids for more than a decade by then. I was excited to join their club.

There was something so seductive about it all. So sweet and safe and cozy. Though I am grateful always that I did not marry that man or have children with him, I seem to always feel such painful nostalgia when I remember those early years in our house together.

My friend Frank and I went on a walk last night and in an effort to stay off the over-crowded city trail, I suggested we walk west into the quiet streets beyond. And there, we found ourselves in my old neighborhood.

I told him the story of how my partner and I got lost trying to find the house when we first met the rental agent for a walk-through. As we talked, I could literally see the car go by that we were in that afternoon. That was October 2009, yet it felt like yesterday.

I showed Frank the house, which I haven’t seen in three — maybe four — years. The two beautiful willows that used to be next to the property are gone now, which saddened me. And I was shocked to find that the mint and strawberries that I had planted ten years ago are still there! I almost cried to see that — my footprint, still visible. The effort I put into that home to make it beautiful and nourishing for us is now there, making someone else happy. I hope.

And as we walked away, I saw a million images of myself on those streets. I remembered riding my bike to work. Walking my dog every day for five years, mapping every street.

I remembered the time my nephews slept over, when they were still so little, before my nieces were born, before little Alex, back when Kai was such a tiny 4-year-old. We went to the track and the boys raced, but Kai couldn’t keep up with his older brothers and he cried. I said, “Hey, sweetie, would you race me?”

He kept crying until I started walk-running at a pace that he easily beat. I still remember his little face looking back over his shoulder again and again, lighting up with each glance as the distance between us grew, the way he screamed, “Auntie! Look how fast I am! I’m beating you!”

I knew then that I would always remember that moment, seeing him so jubilant like that, loving that kid so damn much, even though he wasn’t mine.

As I write this, I remember that that happened about a month after my partner left me, a time when I realized I would probably not become a mother. I had been devastated. But being in the company of my nephews had made my heart light up almost as much as Kai’s face that day.

“Wow, it’s huge,” Frank said when he saw the house yesterday.

It was, I suppose. Everything seems huge to me now that I live in a house that’s only 600 square feet.

It was a normal-sized house — an average 3-bedroom, no bigger than any of the others in this area. But it was big enough to have all my family members over for a holiday party, which I did, often, and can no longer do in the house in which I live now.

The living room was big enough for a giant sleepover with the kids, a dance party (if we moved the couch), and all the cushy chairs I could find to fill the space for all the guests I wanted to have over.

The main bedroom was gigantic, plenty big enough for my partner’s California King bed and with a huge window and pretty glass door leading out to the backyard. And I had picked out the room for the baby — the room that I had used as an office. I often wondered what it would look like with a crib in it when I was sitting in there, working.

I know it sounds funny to say, but I always thought that house longed for a family. It was kinda big. It was meant for more than two people and a dog.

I felt like it sighed and smiled when my nephews visited. It seemed to swell with satisfaction when I had the family over for holiday parties.

When I moved out, I felt both defeated and hopeful. I remember standing in the living room one last time, after loading up the last of my boxes. The room seemed gaping and huge, just the way I remembered it when my partner and I first walked in on that October day in 2009.

I didn’t know who was going to move in after me — if they would have kids or not — but I felt the house’s longing for that. And I felt its sadness for me that I was leaving all alone — not with the man who had moved in with me, and without the dog, either, who had died just months before in that huge living room.

I left that house to its emptiness. And I left it empty-handed. But I touched the wall one last time and whispered, “I hope you get the family you deserve.”

And I swear, she whispered back, “I hope you do, too.”

Every year, I think this sadness will abate. And yet, it never does.

What is it?

I don’t miss my ex. I don’t wish things had gone differently for us, except that maybe I had been smarter and had left sooner, perhaps giving myself a chance to try again with someone else.

I do miss the house. A little bit. Maybe a lot. I miss the way I made it a sanctuary for us. A true home. And I miss how safe I felt there.

I miss my dog terribly, even five years later. I miss him in ways that I cannot express.

Is this sadness and nostalgia about him? About the house?

Or is it sadness that I lost my window? That my little plan went awry and I don’t think I will ever dream of decorating a baby’s room again? That my life is not just beginning anymore…that my youth passed by so damn quickly?

Or am I sad because I love that Yael so damn much and can’t do a thing about it? I know what she went through. I know how she struggled. I know how optimistic she tried to be about her circumstances. I know how alone she was, especially in her relationship. I know how goddamn hard she tried.

I would give anything to encounter her now, as a separate self. To guard her. To hold her. To tell her what was coming so she could try to choose something else, or at least to hold her hand through those years of overwhelming heartbreak.

“I miss it so much,” I told Frank, as we walked away from that neighborhood. “There’s something about that time in my life that I miss so damn much.”

“It can’t be the boyfriend,” he joked. “So what it is?”

“I don’t know,” I said, for the thousandth time. “I just don’t know.”

We passed the track where Kai and I raced five years ago, his face so bright, his grin so wide. But I didn’t think as much about him as I usually do — I thought about myself.

It was too late by then to save that woman. I still feel the ghosts of her grief. And I love her so much — the woman who was both that hopeful 34-year-old moving in with her boyfriend and also the 38-year-old whose world had just been shattered. And there she was, bleeding out but racing her nephew so he wouldn’t cry.

Maybe all this sadness is only for her. Maybe some part of her will always be in that house, walking those sidewalks with her sweet pup, and running with Kai on the track.

© Yael Wolfe 2020