Nostalgia as Yearning for Eden
I was speaking with my fiancée’s father the other day and he is a man who is incredibly nostalgic and often seeks to recreate the past in as exact a way as possible. There was one time very recently when he and his wife, my fiancée’s mom, met us in Oxford because my fiancée and I were studying at Oxford University for the term and we went to a milkshake shop because my fiancée and I really enjoyed it while we were there. Part of the reason we enjoyed this store is because they had so many flavor options, probably a couple hundred options. Much more than a regular restaurant. My fiancée's Dad decided to get the butterscotch flavor one since that was his favorite flavor to get as a kid at an ice cream store that had closed down. As a result, when he actually took his first sip, he hated it because it did not taste the same as the one he had as a child. This made me think about how common it is to be nostalgic. It seems to be a universal human experience, as past events viewed throug