Former Century FOMO
My family emigrated to America from Sweden when I was a young girl. I spent my childhood helping my family with our farm in Minnesota while trying my best to maintain my Swedish heritage and also assimilate to American life.
Just kidding. That’s the childhood story of Kirsten Larson, the American Girl doll. She was born in the 1840s and became an American girl in the mid-19th century. I, on the other hand, was a boring American child born in the 1980s who came into her own in the 21st century. I should be nostalgic for summer days playing with my neighbors and having sleepovers in Lion King sleeping bags. Instead, I find myself longing for days like Kirsten’s that I only experienced through her books.
I’ve always considered myself an “old soul”. I think that for a few different reasons. First, I’m a young person who acts elderly. I appreciate my alone time, I am set in my ways, I fall asleep reading, and I can’t walk up a hill without worrying about my knees. I have even recently considered purchasing a life alert.
I’m also an old soul because I connect deeply with different time periods. Many people listen to The Beatles and feel spiritually aligned with the changing times of the late 1960s and 1970s. Some of us watched Mad Men and felt like we belonged in those clothes, those homes, and those horrible relationships with misogynistic men. I certainly find myself wistful for the early Hollywood days, or New York City prior to the Great Depression, or turn-of-the-century London.
Lately, I’ve found myself longing for a time even further back than the century I was born. I sometimes wonder if I’m not merely an old soul, but actually the ghost of a young Victorian girl. I watch Pride and Prejudice and ache for walking around large properties in an empire waist dress, writing letters by candlelight, and taking strolls about the room to pass the time. I long for balls and choreographed dances where I and my many siblings are anxiously married off by our mother. Everything about me is resistant to the societal rules and expectations of that time, but I feel such intense nostalgia for the 18th and 19th centuries that it hurts.
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows calls this feeling, “anemoia”. It says, “Imagine stepping through the frame into a sepia-tinted haze, where you could sit on the side of the road and watch the locals passing by. Who lived and died before any of us arrived here, who sleep in some of the same houses we do, who look up at the same moon, who breathe the same air, feel the same blood in their veins—and live in a completely different world.”
That is exactly how I feel. I long for worlds I never even experienced! Sure, my childhood watching movies and television with my sister was fun, but gathering around the HEARTH would have been far superior. I long for waking up on Christmas morning to morning buns, a roaring fire, a piano singalong, long nightgowns, and retreating to our bed chambers with taper candles. Going to church on Sundays, or town meeting halls, and wearing HATS! So many hats!
Ultimately, I’m drawn to a more wholesome lifestyle. When we read and watch adaptations of Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Louisa May Alcott, etc. we’re only getting a small glimpse into an elaborated portrait of what life was really like. Of course, I’m grateful for modern medicine, vaccines, electricity, the internet, and most importantly, dry-erase boards. Yet, I feel such strong nostalgia for a simpler time. I’m so burnt out by #HUSTLE culture. I feel anxious while reading because I could be doing something more productive, and I don’t get together with friends as much because we see each others’ lives on social media. I generally want fewer options and less accessibility.
The early quarantine during the pandemic gave me a small glimpse into what life was like in the olden days before we had everything we could ever want. Life slowed down and I was left with a void. I was terrified the emptiness would drive me into a deep depression, but the opposite happened. I started being mindful of what helped me stay sane and that was connection. First with myself, through at-home workouts and walking in nature and reading and cooking my own meals every night. Then, with my family, friends, and community.
The pandemic forced us all to find new ways to connect, provided opportunities to get creative and spend more time in nature and not be in our cars so much. We took up home-based hobbies and supported local businesses to keep our communities afloat. Yes, we shopped online through Amazon and used Instacart for groceries, and had computers. Yet, life wasn’t so busy and our worlds were less vast and it brought me a sense of calm.
I also realize that I have a former century FOMO for the lives of fictional women that actively fought against the rules and went against the societal norms (because the authors couldn’t in real life.) Yet, I am going to lean into my nostalgia and use it to create my own little 19th-century life. I am slowing down a little, nourishing myself and my mind, signing out of my social media accounts, going for walks, and actively connecting with people in a real way. I will not, however, wear corsets, marry my cousin, or trade my indoor plumbing for a chamber pot.