Old Friends, Frozen Feelings: Why the Past Thaws So Fast

Okay, friends, does this ever happen to you? You run into someone from way back, and suddenly you're right back in that time. Back in those old friendships. And somehow you can just plug right back in, even if you haven't seen each other in 25 years. “Hey, you're here?! God, what a time that was. How are you? What are you up to?” As if half a lifetime didn't sit between the last time you met and today.

Music from back then does this to me all the time. That feeling from way back is instantly there again. Same when we see Tamagotchis, or Raider wrappers (that's what Twix was called in Germany back then), all those things that connected us and somehow still create a sense of community today. It's as if we saved feelings along with all those people and things, and we can just pull them back out and reheat them. A little like frozen food. Preserved and good for a long time.

Our kids are making tomorrow's old friends right now

And isn't it wild that our kids are meeting exactly those people right now? Saving exactly those products of their childhood and teen years? Maybe the guy they had a year-long phone friendship with never comes up again, until 25 years later, through some social platform or an event or who knows what, they spot each other again and pick up right where they left off.

It was so funny on Halloween at our house. Wild preparations for the evening's parties were going on in every corner. In one corner, fake blood was being smeared onto faces with forks. In the next, someone was already done and urgently needed a ride to the pregame. And honestly, it really wasn't that long ago that this was us!

How lovely that it keeps going in the next generation

I still love going out and partying every now and then myself, but Halloween isn't really my thing. That night I was just looking forward to a cozy evening at home and an early bedtime. Around 2 a.m. I heard noises. (You still wake up at every little peep, like back when you had babies, right?) I thought, phew, all the kids are home safe, now I can turn off my phone. (I only leave it on when the kids are out.) Then I got a little hello from the last kid to come home, and I was so happy.

Getting to witness all of it, the experiences, the curiosity, that the-world-is-still-ahead-of-me feeling, from the warmth of my own comfy bed is just phenomenal. It goes on. It spills over into the next generation. And who knows which of these people they'll run into decades from now, catapulting themselves back to this time with a “Remember back then?” Just like we do now.

Your turn: What takes you right back to your teen years?

So now it's your turn: Do you still have friends from back then? Are there people you bumped into by chance and could instantly click with again? After a relationship that didn't work out, did you maybe rediscover your first love and you're even happy together today? Or are there old flames where you could picture that? Have friendships bloomed again that you had totally forgotten about?

And what brings that warm feeling back, so the memory comes alive and you feel transported to that time? A movie (Immenhof, the German horse-farm films?), a show, an audio drama (TKKG, the German teen detective series, or Bibi, the little witch?), a candy (Raider?), a magazine (Bravo, the German teen magazine? Yps, the German kids' comic?), a product (a Scout school backpack? Eastpak? Doc Martens or Buffalos?). Tell us! We can't wait to hear.