We’ve all seen the Instagram trend that surfaced a while ago, “My Roman Empire is….” The expression “Roman Empire” means something you think about very often, something that preoccupies your thoughts. It was a silly social media trend, but I think everybody, somewhere deep in their hearts, has a Roman Empire of their own. Something that they can’t stop thinking about. My Roman Empire is Nostalgia.

Sometimes when I’m all alone with my thoughts, I think about Nostalgia. Nostalgia is such a bittersweet feeling, and yet it holds so many emotions. The thousands of sentiments you feel when you touch the toys you used to play with in your childhood. The emotions you feel when a certain smell you associate with a time period of your life hits your nose. A heart full of exultation when you visit your old school after a long time and all the memories that come swimming back to you.

Nostalgia is a distant feeling, a reminiscence of happier times. Nostalgia feels like a quiet corridor with the rooms of your memories aligned at your elbows. When you close your eyes you hear the distant sound of laughter, chatter of people you love or once loved and sometimes your own, you get a whiff of your childhood in the quiet of that corridor. The uncanny quietness of how life used to be. You start to make headway in the direction of all the voices luring you, and when you finally reach the room of your memories, you see yourself and all the people you once loved. You want to unlatch that room and go inside, not to change anything but to live those moments again, but you can’t.

You are stuck in that corridor and cannot do anything except looking at the room of your memories.

Such a beautiful feeling Nostalgia is and such a beautiful notion a Roman Empire is.