Nostalgia by Abigail

Nostalgia by Abigail - July 2025 Scholarship Essay

The memory shimmers, almost taunting me. Laughter and smiles from everyone I'm surrounded by, the relentless heat of ninety degrees, the sun blazing, and the easy rhythm of a soccer ball being passed around. That's what I had been dreaming of just a couple of weeks ago. I was dreaming of my younger self, carefree and full of boundless energy, playing soccer with my neighbors who were, back then, my best friends. These moments live with me every day, a bittersweet feeling that has somehow become a curse. I often find myself wishing I could build a time machine, a desperate contraption to take me back to those simpler times.

Nostalgia will always be my biggest enemy. If I could go back, I would tell my younger self “Cherish every single moment, even the small ones. Breathe in the air, feel the sun on your skin, and remember the sound of laughter. You will miss this, more than you can imagine." I hadn’t understood then how profoundly every little memory would impact me now, how the weight of the past could feel both comforting and crushing. It's like carrying a box of photographs, each one a vibrant piece of paper filled with happiness, but the box itself grows heavier with each passing year. I wish to recapture the lightness, the long-gone memories of those days, but I know that time only moves in one direction.

Now, being a seventeen-year-old preparing for my last year of high school, the weight of expectations and responsibilities presses down on me, and I’m excited and proud of my accomplishments. But I know I will always want to be that young girl who was naive and gullible. The young girl with hundreds of memories, with the people whom she cared for and loved. Now the laughter of my childhood friends seems distant, almost like a song from another life. I wonder if they feel the pull of nostalgia, if they also dream of sun-drenched afternoons and the simple joy of soccer. Maybe, I think, the curse of nostalgia isn’t about wanting to go back, but about being compassionate about how those moments shaped who I am now, and finding a way to carry that joy forward, even as life changes around me. I know that my present self can also take this advice into accountability, but to my younger self I say “cherish every single moment, even the smallest ones, because you will miss them”.