Tears #4: Nostalgia

two years ago I sat down to watch 'Transformers the movie' in a small cinema in Barrie. It was exciting enough that this film was going to send me back to my youth, but to do so in an 80's style cinema was truly special. I was a huge fan of the cartoon growing up, particularly the main character Optimus Prime. Other than those very vague years between the ages of 4 and 8 years old I have no other attachment to the transformers world but, nevertheless, it holds a place in my heart. Sitting down to watch this movie, I was most excited about what the robots where going to look like, having already discredited the movies as another blockbuster heartless piece of junk. After all Michael Bay is better at giving his audience seizures than pleasure.

the movie proved to be boring and almost incomprehensible. Halfway through the film, Optimus Prime was unveiled. He steps out and the sound effects and rumbling instantly brought me back to my living room as a child. He spoke one sentence and I began to cry. I was truly overwhelmed with memory as I transformed from tough guy to little kid. The nostalgia was too much to bear.

Nostalgia is a feeling we get when we remember something from our youth. Good nostalgia
(positive memories) is a warm feeling of 'better days'. Even the smell of plastic reminds me of the 1980s because of my array of plastic action heroes growing up.

Optimus Prime was my god. He made sense to me when I was a kid. A robot that saved universes is a total fathomable thing for a child. It makes much more sense than a down on his luck investor who wants to supply for his family. Knowing this about children will help you deal with them greatly. Also knowing this about ourselves, and how powerful nostalgia is, can help us understand each other. We want to go back to a time when it was realistic to be completely unrealistic, because reality was too hard to grasp. As children we go through a time where reality doesn't make sense. It's too hard to comprehend. What makes more sense is the mystical abilities of robots. The stuff we really want to know more about.

It is as if we are introduced to this planet. We experience it and then right away begin questioning our limits. Immediately we are attracted to everything we cannot do. Eventually, we have to come back down to earth (most of us) and live within the boundaries of reality. Many people grow to accept this so much, that they discredit themselves as non creative and decide to ignore children for the rest of their lives.

when we are children we ask questions. Why can't I fly? What is it like on the moon? How can I somehow get a million dollars build a rocket ship and then fly to another dimension?

We follow statistics of superheros. Gambits stamina: 8, agility: 7, creativity 8.5.

Nostalgia is an admittance of a vulnerable time. A time we wish we lived in and are truly sad to have left. whether we were vulnerable or not, we feel vulnerable in retrospect. Probably becuase we learned from that experience. Since we, as humans, secretly admire vulnerability and wish for a return to vulnerability, when we get overwhelmed with nostalgia we cry. It is an excuse to become vulnerable. Thus, I was truly vulnerable to Optimus Prime at the age of 25, because I was truly vulnerable to him at 5. Strawberry shortcake the movie will surely make me ball.