What Make You Nostalgic?

[Twitch]

OK there is probably some catalyst that makes your mind go off to its happy place in the vintage past. Is it when you don your vintige clothes or hat? When you watch old movies? When you pick up a book about the vintage era? Music? What?

I'd say for me it is the WW II movies that puts me in orbit. Old cars, old planes and old clothes

 

[LizzieMaine]

Smells. For example, whenever I smell kerosene, I'm transported back to childhood and my grandparents' house -- which reeked of kerosene because of the stove in the living room. Most people think that's a terrible odor, but for me it's the scent of happy memories.

 

[LadyDeWinter]

For me it's also smells. For example the smell of a gas oven. My grandparents had a gas oven in the kitchen. And old music and furniture. All this let me travel back in time.

 

[HamletJSD]

The cold weather ...
I suppose because nice jackets, coats, and felt hats are too hot for any other time, when winter comes around I always "feel" vintage and nostalgic.

Additionally, so many of the classic old movies are set around Christmas time ... or at least some time when the people in them are wearing coats about!

 

[Fletch]

Prop planes parked on grass.
The first coatless day in late winter or early spring.
The first snowfall (cue up Claude Thornhill).
Old cars. "Old" defined as 30 years or older.
Preschool toys like rubber puppets, felt cutouts, and Community blocks.
The smells of decaying newspaper, fresh concrete/lumber, and for some damn reason...Liquid Prell.

 

[AmateisGal]

Autumn always makes me nostalgic. I think of my family a lot around this time of year - we have such great traditions for Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Others:

Listening to big band music, Frank Sinatra, Rosemary Clooney, or Doris Day.

Reading Bess Streeter Aldrich.

Watching classic movies.

Reading historical fiction - especially WW2 fiction - curled up on the couch under a warm blanket with the wind (and sometimes snow) blowing outside.

 

[Haversack]

Another vote for smells here. Its hard for me to describe but I have very distinct memories of the smells of my grandparents houses. The dry smell of the 1930s carpet in my maternal grandparents' living room and the damp dustiness of the storage room they added off the kitchen. Memories of my paternal grandparents house are bound up in smells of Pears Soap, moth balls, wood polish, roast leg of lamb, and orange trees. Give me a whiff of diesel exhaust on a cold day and I am instantly transported back to the batallion motor pool in Germany at 4 AM on a February morning during a roll-out.

Haversack.

 

[The Shirt]

The smell/sight of an old man smoking a pipe,
streamline campers flying down the highway,
eating a big ol' steak at a old steakhouse, the kind with a giant fiberglass cow in the front of the place and Mom's Beef Stroganoff.

 

[carter]

Old music on AM 770 in Dallas.
Old movies, especially from the 40's and early 50's.
Old family photos.
The scents of Autumn, especially woodsmoke from someone's chimney.
The smell of new-mown grass or a boxwood hedge.
Holiday lights.

 

[panamag8or]

Another vote for smells here. Give me a whiff of diesel exhaust on a cold day and I am instantly transported back to the batallion motor pool in Germany at 4 AM on a February morning during a roll-out.

Haversack.

That makes me think of band trips and school buses.

Also, fresh-cut grass and lawn mower exhaust reminds me of mowing the lawn with my Grandfather. Actually, he mowed, and I ran around picking up the pine cones.

Oh, yeah... the smell of an open Zippo.

 

[Foofoogal]

Smells, children playing but especially Christmas. I am 5 years old at Christmas. I adore it.

 

[zaika]

My gramma's beef stew, the smell of her freshly laundered linens. The occassional whiff of cigarette or pipe smoke. A stack of freshly chopped wood in the chest my grandpa buildt. Vincent de Gallo wine (my grandma always had a gallon of it around...LOL). Chalkboards. Moonlight Seranade and Star Dust. Seeing a beautiful old car gliding down the highway. Movies from the 30's. Old Christmas ornaments. Childcraft books.

how much room do we have in these posts? lol

 

[Jay]

-The smell of mothballs in an old suit
-Ivory Soap (not sure why)
-The smell of my garage (a combination of oil, gasoline, lawnmower and my 55 Chevy)
-Chesterfields
-I'm not sure what it is, maybe the carpet, of some older houses. It has a timeworn, home-y smell to it. Like at my grandparents place.

-Also reading Chandler, Kerouac or Hammet-probably all the talk about whiskey, hardwood floors, cigarettes, suits, and music, but this is probably a given. Still can't stop me from wanting to put on a suit and hat & smoke a cigarette.

 

[RIOT]

- Being around old cars (pre '64 types)
- The smell of Gasoline, Leather, my Pomade
- Old Photographs
- St. Mark's Place in the East Village
- Seeing Old Haunts/Landmarks from my youth-gone-wild years such as Bleeker Bob's, Cherry Tavern, CBGB's, Alcatraz (old hardcore club/bar), Alphabet City, Thompkins & Washington Square Parks, Bricklane (6th St in the Village where all the Indian Restaurants are located), ABC No Rio, Rodeo Bar, Union Pool..
- Recently opening up an old suitcase containing my Flight jacket, Harrington, Crombie, Ben Sherman's.
- Historic Jackson Heights area
- Old Car Club Plaques i've collected through the years
- Pop Rocks

just to list a few

 

[panamag8or]

Old movies and vintage cars....My grandpa showing me pictures during the war....(R.i.p Gramps you'll missed)Victory rolls and stories my grandma would tell me about her life in Hollywood During the Golden Age.

You should elaborate on this in another thread... unless you already have.

 

[Amy Jeanne]

Listening to my 1930s CDs while driving to work at 6am puts me in a nostalgic mood -- even though I'm playing a CD and driving an '08 Jetta. It's not the devices, it's the mixture of the music and the darkness. Watching an old movie after midnight in complete darkness is the perfect way to immerse myself in the 1930s that never existed, but does in my daydreams! And this might sound crazy, but dreams make me nostalgic, too. If I wake up in the middle of the night (again, in the dark) I get thoughts of the 30s running in my head. It's great.

I guess you could say the dark makes me nostalgic. The dark is perfect for fantisizing about the 20s and 30s -- two rather "dark" decades.

 

[CharlieH.]

Music, and plenty of it.
And of course, certain dames.

 

[dhermann1]

Smells

The sense of smell is by far the oldest of the senses. When an amoeba senses the presence of food near him (her?) it's the primordial sense of smell at work. The olifactory organs are connected to a much more primitive part of the brain, so smells produce a quantum level stronger reaction that any other sense. This is why smells also produce such a strong emotional response. And then there is the pheromones. The pheremone sense organ is right next to the smell receptors. You don't actually smell anythinig, but the emotional response is triggered.
What makes me nostalgic? All of the above. Falling leaves, empty woods with creaking trees, old black and white photos of long dead friends and family members. Going on Fedora Lounge.

 

[Twitch]

The aromas for sure are triggers. Old cars have a unique smell inside too. and a few people have asked if they could stick their head in my old car at shows and get a nostalgia hit!

 

[PolkaDotMeggie]

What makes me nostalgic? What doesn't? Nothing is better than a little imagination mixed with vintage colors or patterns. I am crazy about fabrics and patterns. I can imagine how I am going to decorate my home-- the colors on the walls, the perfect shade of stain on the wood floors, the way the sun comes through the stainglass windows. Now that is the perfect home!