Blog Post #1I Once Was Miss America
I completely agree with Roxane Gay, nostalgia truly does reshape our memories. That statement brought me back to a childhood friend I met when I moved to my hometown at the start of grade school. He was my neighbor and we were the same age. We became best friends over time and spent countless hours together. When I first met him, he was an innocent kind of person who didn’t do much, he didn’t even go out to trick or treat during Halloween. He was smart, funny, and kind. It seemed like he became more open as we socialized, which led to us creating a larger group of friends. He was one of my first friends and we will always be friends. We were young and naïve about life, I never thought anything would change our friendship.
My friend, my neighbor, is no longer the same friend I grew up with.
During our middle and high school years, we became busy with school and new groups of friend. I kept the same kind of friends around; the kind, funny, and smart ones. I didn’t hang out with my old friend as much as I used to, however, when we did cross paves, I noticed something different about his personality and the way he acted. He was not the same person I remembered before; he instead acted like someone he was not. I began to see the big picture; our separation caused my old friend to associate with a different crowd, a crowd who he was not truly part of. I could see his attempt in trying to fit into this crowd, but my nostalgic memories of our child memories caused me to dislike him. He was not the same person I became friends with. I compare him with his past personality and it hurts me to see that he has gone down the wrong path. I could have honestly respected him if I didn’t know him before, but I knew his past. My nostalgia of our memories as friends caused me to judge him, similar to how Gay didn’t appreciate the change in the Wakefield sisters from the original series to the newer addition. Gay, in the end, continued to appreciate the sisters and the Sweet Valley series because they were a part of her childhood, making it nostalgic. My old friend may be different, but he is still my friend.
