Back Home Again

There are vanishingly few direct throughlines to my childhood. I suppose that's the case for everyone, isn't it? I suppose that's been the case for years now. Childhood makes way for our teens make way for our early 20s make way for our late 20s make way for our early 30s and so on and so on. Yes, the things that imprint on us when we're our youngest are the most deep-rooted of all, but as the stages of life progress they dull, soften, blur. The memories fade, but the feelings certainly don't. I can still feel the first time I beat Sonic 3. Still feel the first time I held hands with a girl. My first piece of sushi, first signed offer letter for a job, moving in to my first apartment. My brain remembers nothing of the specifics, but my body doesn't care. It remembers the feelings anyway.

These memories offer no practical benefit and frankly they're often shoved aside to make room for thoughts about what's changed – mostly for the worse. Everything's more expensive and less durable. Things you used to be able to buy and own have been re-packaged as subscriptions and sold back to you at higher prices. Wanton corporate greed has led to mergers and takeovers and consolidation; products and services are worse, and consumers are worse off for it. B.J. Novak showed us that Cadbury Creme Eggs have gotten smaller. Sports gambling ads are oppressive. I could add another thousand things to this list and wouldn't even come close to cataloging one hundredth of one tenth of one percent of our societal woes. Even if I somehow finished the list, more would arise along the way. Things ain't what they used to be, the saying goes.

Speaking of sayings: They say every time you remember something, you're really remembering the last time you remembered it. They also say nostalgia is the most powerful drug of all. I think that's right. It's no pill, obviously (if it were, the Sackler family would be desperately marking up its prices and pretending it's harmless), but it's sold to us in a billion different ways. Buy your favorite sports team's retro-inspired jersey! Buy the 4K remaster of the HD remake of your favorite VHS movie! Better yet, buy the vinyl version of your favorite band's latest album to replicate that old-timey feel! The past can never get worse, after all. Live in it forever!

All of this is to say I try not to get lost in nostalgia because I think it does a disservice to the present. But it's Memorial Day weekend, and that means the running of the Indianapolis 500, a race my dad watched with his friend Bill Hall ("Uncle Bill") every year of my childhood as far back as I can remember. That's my specific flavor of nostalgia. So naturally, I'm watching today. My body needs its fix.

I could not tell you who is racing today and I do not care in the slightest. I scanned through the starting grid to see if I recognized anyone's name and those, too, are vanishingly few. Helio Castroneves is still there, the guy who won back-to-backs in the early 2000s. Wikipedia tells me he's run just over 300 races. If you'd asked me to guess, I'd have said 15,000. Scott Dixon is still there, and there's a Rahal (Graham, if you're curious). There's also apparently a guy named "Sting Ray Robb," which ... come on, no there isn't. That's an A.I.-generated name and an A.I.-generated picture of what that guy would look like. That's insane and you're not fooling me, race organizers.

I could not tell you what this race means in the broader context of the race season or anyone's professional career. Again, I do not care in the slightest. You could tell me that Alexander Rossi promised an orphanage full of sick children he'd win the race or you could tell me Kyffin Simpson plans to use the prize money on a statue of Pol Pot giving Stalin a high five. I do not care. (Okay, I'd care a little, if only because I'd have a million follow-up questions.)

I know all the cars are rolling billboards. I know the broadcast keeps finding innovative new ways of shoving more ads down our throats. I know the Borg-Warner Trophy looks like a horrifying mausoleum that contains the souls of previous winners. I know that the passage of time inevitably means losses: Jim Nabors last sang in 2014 and passed away three short years later. Uncle Bill died of complications from multiple sclerosis well before that. My dad is still alive, but some days he looks like he's feeling his age twice over.

I recognize all the issues and the downsides. The photocopy is never as good as the original. Time's arrow points forever forward and its march cannot be slowed or stalled. I'll never again wake up on Sunday morning to a pancake breakfast and the dulcet tones of Gomer Pyle's "Back Home Again in Indiana." Uncle Bill won't be walking through the front door. There are vanishingly few novel experiences in life, which is part of what makes the nostalgia so appealing in the first place. We can't go back, but I can tune in and let my body take me back. The memories will never be perfect, but the feelings always are.

Happy Memorial Day eve, everyone.