Nostalgia
It's not always a good thing
I swear this will be the last post centered around my new-to-me, antique sewing machine … for now.
Admittedly, one of the reasons I bought the machine was because it’s almost 100 years old and it still works which is a good thing. We definitely, as a general rule, don’t make things like we used to. There’s no way my 10 year old modern machine will be working in 80 years, even if I had bought a more expensive model.
Apparently my grandmother had a similar black Singer. Which I also find cool. But I sew as a hobby — I hope for wearable results but it’s not the end of the world if they’re not. Given what I know of my grandmother, I expect sewing was necessary to clothe her family of nine.
The machine got me thinking about nostalgia and how it can be harmful (not my idea, I’ve heard this before). We tend to think of nostalgia as a warm blanket, but it can hold us back, individually and as a society.
For example, wanting your kids to grow up in a quiet residential neighbourhood. Seems great … but that results in car-dependent sprawl. The city I live in now had almost half the population when I was a child, and where I live was farmland. If we built enough of those neighbourhoods for everyone, it would mean paving over more farmland.
Another example: I used to watch homesteading videos. The idea of growing my own food appeals to me. However, I realized that the life that was being sold in those videos isn’t possible for most people. I grew up around farming families; I know how many of them had at least one partner working off the farm. And even if everyone could have a farm (and wanted to farm), well, that’s a lot of land in a world of 8 billion people.
I recently listened to a Stuff You Should Know episode on the middle class. Which is a good overview what middle class might mean these days and where it stands. Yes, there were positives during the heyday of the middle class in the US and Canada, but it wasn’t all roses.
Back to my grandmother. When I was born, she wouldn’t have been able to apply for a credit card in her own name.
It wasn’t great for women who wanted independence or found themselves in abusive marriages. It also wasn’t great if you were LGBTQ+. Heck, it wasn’t great if you had cancer or polio. Okay, it’s still not great if you have those things but one has many more treatments and the other we can vaccinate against. Wait, we can actually vaccinate against both — some cancers have vaccines now. (As an aside, science is awesome.)
That’s a whole lot of rambling, and not really book related. But it’s musing inspired by a sewing machine. It’s important not to look through rose-coloured glasses at a past that didn’t actually exist. We should see the good and the bad with open eyes.
Writing update
Wow, you’ve stuck around! I’ve started working on a new novel! I’m very excited. Though I enjoyed writing the short story I just finished — not so short at almost 10K words though. It’ll be starting on Armchair Alien later this week … or early next.
In the meantime, check out this guest post from Audrey Sharp.
I read Audrey’s story in the sci-fi holiday anthology Now I Have a Raygun, Ho-Ho-Ho, and quite enjoyed it. I’ve picked up The Dark of Light, which I plan to read as soon as I get a replacement for my malfunctioning ereader.
Happy reading!
— CR
Where to find my books
If you’d like to read any of my sci-fi or urban fantasy books, you can find them at your favourite online retailers. Or you can buy them direct from me on the Armchair Alien store.