Nostalagia

Happy memories for me I often just sit quietly thinking and I sometimes look through all the old family photos enjoying letting my mind wander back there.

Mostly happy memories - weird feelings of deja vu at times when I hear a certain record and often being 'back' in that moment from different periods of life. It's nice to share them with family and my other half who I've known since we were kids

Definitely happy memories!

Poignant - that is a mixture of happy, sad and wistful.

A mixture of life and how its events have touched me,some very happy moments and others ultra sad and others deeply poignant,where real life hits hard....... and those memories etched in your mind for ever

Happy memories but also a longing for what once was.

Very interesting replies, thanks. The reason I asked is that I know that I personally cannot dwell on my happy or sad past life without getting too sad with sense of loss of times that are gone. I'm frightened of loss. I have to stop myself remembering and not dwell too much, but rather divert my attention to the present.

Asked my son that question and he and I agreed that it's bad to indulge in nostalgia if that means feeling sad about loss. He himself doesn't feel nostalgic loss, only nostalgic happiness, and he thought his brother is the same, old memories are happy memories.

I note that those of you who replied have a happy attitude to old times.

The Welsh language has the word Hiraeth, it is assumed it means homesickness but it’s more , there is no English word it can be translated into

For anyone interested x

sites.psu.edu/kielarpassionblog2/2016/04/02/hiraeth/

Annie Thank you for the link. I read the link and the explanation of homesickness, yearning, and longing. That comes really close, but there's still 'something' that I can't quite put my finger on!

Squify, that is what hiraerth is, all those things yet more, hence it cannot be translated , a feeling within us we cannot put into words because there isn’t one which really explains , so many have tried to find a translation but only come near, there is that one thing for which there is no word in the English language

I often used to have a real yearning for my mum. When I was 29, married with 2 children, she and my dad moved a long way away from me (long story). It broke my heart as I wasn't able to see her very often and I would get these powerful yearnings for her. I have tears in my eyes just writing this now........... They both died a good few years ago but I'll never get over how I felt then and how much it hurts to just think back to those times

Anniebach thanks for the link to Hiraeth. Reading it I got tears in my eyes .

Hiraeth totally sums up how I feel without my parents and grandparents. Hope they can see me and can see how much they are missed and remembered on a daily basis.

A longing for childhood ?

All sad for me and I have to work hard not to dwell and think about what might have been. Sorry I know that's not helpful.

For me it's mostly music, which brings back memories. There's a french radio programme called Nostalgie that plays all the oldies from the 60s & 70s et.
Sometimes looking at old photos gives the same feeling, but at the moment I don't yearn for the 'Good Old Days', and family members.
Maybe I'm a hard hearted Hannah.

Yes, Anniebach, that too. Childhood was so innocent and magical.

Teetime, I hope you find some sort of happiness in the present. I could quote the gypsy in Romany Rye.

“There's night and day, brother, both sweet things; sun, moon, and stars, brother, all sweet things; there's likewise a wind on the heath. Life is very sweet, brother; who would wish to die?”

To me it’s anything that evokes happy memories of days gone by .... like Fennel said, music does this for me plus looking at old photos .... also, listening to my 3 AC reminiscing about their childhood and the many funny stories. I was always trying new recipes on them and it was years before they told me that many of my dinners ended up in the duck pond when I wasn’t looking !

Yes Hiraeth sums it up for me.

I agree with F55. Pretty much says it all.

Very happy memories, when I look back, ok there have been the odd grim moments but by and large I have had a GREAT life and am very nostalgic for school, my working life, even my older girlfriends although I have been happily married for almost fifty years.

No whilst I probably couldn’t spell it without a dictionary (doesn’t THAT date me!) nostalgia is a warm cosy feeling

Not at all.

Happy memories/ Hiraeth