Running Through Nostalgia

An excuse for reminiscing

Photo by Rirri on Unsplash, rendered black & white by me

Sometimes, when I’m in my hometown, I take the car to go for a run. It might sound like an oxymoron, or nonsense, but it simply means that where I enjoy running is a twenty-minute drive away. My place is in the countryside, where hills make roads undulate, whereas my preferred running spot is along the coast, overlooking the sea, straight and flat. So I dress up in running gear and drive there.

I leave the car in a little coastal village where we lived for a few years, back when I was a kid. On the way to my usual parking spot, I drive past our old house and slow down, every time, to check how different it looks from when we lived there. And let memories flow.

It was an entire complex that had been built anew, in an area where real estate development was booming. When we moved there, our street hadn’t even been paved yet. Just a few years prior, Dad and his two brothers had started their business. They purchased this property, where they relocated their offices and warehouse on the ground floor and basement, and our three families lived on the floors above. It was an arrangement that merged both family and business life in one place. A bit peculiar, now that I think of it. But Dad was a family man deeply committed to his work, and I guess it made sense to him to consolidate his life in one location.      

Having business and family in one place meant that there was a certain degree of commingling between the two. We kids would burst into Dad’s office while he was in important meetings with people from far away, or stroll around the warehouse while products were being packed for shipment, or shamelessly bother whoever was intently working at their chores by asking questions, demanding attention, or just ‘hanging around’. Business life with us kids around must have not been easy. And yet, Dad or my uncles or anyone who worked with them never lost their temper, or yelled at us, or threw us out. I only realize this now, thinking back of those days, how unusually nice and natural such family-business commingling was. Dad’s office was at the end of a corridor. A large space shared with my uncles that served as a conference room whenever one of them had to have a meeting with external people. 

I remember once Dad was in a meeting with some people I later learned were from Sweden and, when I casually opened the door and stepped in for no particular reason but wanting to check on him, a prosciutto sandwich in my hand, he said this is my son, with a huge smile, to those gentlemen. He then asked me to get closer so that he could introduce me properly. I was nine, dirty from playing football outside, with my knees scraped, casually chewing on my sandwich -- a barely presentable kid. But he made it as if it was the most natural thing in the world that his son would step into his office without notice during a key business meeting with complete strangers, and for a moment become part of what was happening. He then gently dismissed me saying Daddy’s a little busy now, would you go back out playing? 

We lived upstairs. Our floor had a gigantic terrace where we played football with all the friends we could fit in there. They came in flocks because of that terrace -- no one around there had such a large space to play in. As there was a way to get in without going through our apartment, via a passage in the stairs, it’d get very crowded at times. My folks didn’t mind, as long as no one cursed or got into fights. The goal was chalked on a grey-pinkish wall that got all stained and worn out by continuously shooting at it. Often, the ball would fall off the terrace, down on the street, and we’d all stand there looking out, waiting for someone to pass by and throw it back up. It wasn’t a crowded area; nearby buildings were still in construction and it got deserted after hours. Until one day they opened a hotel right in front, and soon enough the area started to get filled with human presence.

I was eight when we moved in, fifteen when we moved out. Critical years, with indelible memories. Life was a clear horizon, with nothing to worry about. Our parents did an outstanding job at making sure that none of the preoccupations affecting their adult lives would drip down on us. I’ve thought a lot about this over the years, and I’m not entirely sure that isolating us under a glass dome was the best way to go about it. Understandably, they wanted to give us a smoother, easier childhood than the one they had. In any event, I’ve always been grateful to them for this, even when reality checks were excruciatingly painful. They gave me the opportunity to build a library of serene memories that I would summon whenever in need of happy thoughts. 

In that house, I had my first encounter with adult music when I discovered a few Beatles records that my uncle, for some still obscure reason, had thrown away. They were all 45s without sleeves, held inside a plastic case with several compartments that opened like a wallet. We didn’t have a record player system with a turntable, amplifier, and speakers back then. All we had was a portable device with a tray where you'd insert the record, and music would play out of a built-in cheap speaker. I spent countless weeks playing those 45s nonstop. 

In that house, I found out that Santa Claus was a hoax and didn’t take it as a tragedy. I lived in that house when I learned to play chess, got my first guitar, and kissed a girl for the first time. I lived in that house when my best friend was still alive. 

From my car, what was once our place now looks different, and the whole area smaller. The current owners did some substantial construction work. Truth be told, it’s been more than forty years since we moved out, so maybe there has been more than one new owner, with layers upon layers of renovation done. Who knows. It’s only recently that I got to drive all the way here to start my run. In the winter, when I slowly drive past and it’s already dark, I see a few lighted windows and think of what it would be like if I asked these people to visit my old place, see whether it’s still the same or got completely changed. I’d walk to the second floor and ring the bell. They would open the door and I’d make a right turn to my bedroom, the second to last on the left side down the corridor. I bet it’d feel all so small.  

I arrive at my usual parking spot, connect airpods to iwatch, lock the car, and start running. A light breeze and the smell of the sea make all memories dissolve and go back to their right place, in my mind’s library. 

Until my next time here.

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