Nostalgia as Survival
Mary Kate and Ashley, writing in hard times and my essay for TrashLight Press
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Things in my personal life have been very heavy lately. Unknowns, losses, and relying on my faith to carry me through. In the midst of all this, I’ve noticed that my already nostalgic personality has been heavily leaning on pleasant memories of the past to keep me going in the present.
It’s all I want to write about.
As I wait for my agent to give me feedback on my latest novel draft, in this space, I’ve turned to nonfiction during my writing time. I’ve been particularly interested in what I used to be obsessed with in my youth— lots of things I’ve already written about here, like Lord of the Rings, Nirvana, and favorite movies from girlhood.
Most recently, I wrote a piece for a themed submission call that excited me in which I talked about how Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen, specifically in the movie Our Lips Are Sealed, showcased what a lot of early aughts fims didn’t — sisters and girls in general as friends, not as rivals. I talked about how perhaps my sister’s and my own obsession with the twins could have stemmed from seeing the same dynamic we shared - one of true friendship - finally depicted on the screen. Part of my own current hardships has been watching my sister go through a traumatic loss. Writing this piece felt like a balm. We talked about the Olsens on my couch with martinis in hand, reliving the moments together in our collective memory. We couldn’t find Our Lips Are Sealed on any of the streaming platforms I subscribed to, but we watched New York Minute anyway because we needed MK & Ash’s light heartedness, their corny dialogue said through glossed lips. Their sisterness. A reminder of times when things felt whole. Writing that essay felt urgent.
(Fingers crossed it gets accepted!)
In this nostalgic time of mine, I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that my novel is set in 1999. This was a later addition to my manuscript, possibly in draft 5 or 6. When you are writing a draft, you have to find ways to keep the work new and fresh in your eyes and so, plopping my characters into the summer of 1999 just felt right. And it was so much fun! I created a soundtrack and a moodboard. I spent a lot of time on eBay. I wish I could relay all of the details of the research rabbit holes and tidbits that were particularly fascinating for me, but I want to save that for when the book is sold or officially out in the world.
Since this book is so near and dear to my heart, I knew when writing it that I wanted to include as many pieces of myself as made sense. So, how could I not transport my beloved characters back to a time that I love to reminisce about?
So lately— I’ve been singing Mary Kate and Ashley songs in the shower, and rewatching the entire LOTR trilogy through misty eyes and writing about my sister in earnest and praying a lot more and realizing that being a writer is a gift. I get to relive, I get to transport. I get to express my love.
I also recently got a piece published by TrashLight Press! I wrote about being homeschooled, a little known fun fact about myself I like to whip out at parties. I recall the stigma around my school status in the 90s and early 2000s, how I went to a homeschooled graduation ceremony in Virginia, and how basically I was seen as a freak in my teenage years. Again, writing this piece felt fun and necessary and soothing in a dark time. I hope the nostalgia is healing to you too <3
Thank you to
for her edits and encouragement to submit it!
I invite my sister, Karylle, and my cousin, Rachel, over for our annual viewing of The Holiday. A Christmas season tradition. We order pizza and pour glasses of red wine. It is one of the most familiar feelings in the world, the three of us girls settling in for a movie. A ritual we have been practicing together for our whole lives. Karylle had been cleaning her apartment earlier that day, looking through old photos to include in a newly thrifted frame. She brought over some pictures — the three of us as young teenagers in my parent’s kitchen on Thanksgiving. Rachel and Karylle, as five-year-olds, sitting like dolls on a couch in Easter dresses, their hands posed and folded in their lap, no doubt dictated by whoever was behind the camera. A shot of Rachel in what we proclaim to be an archival photo for the year 2000. In a black, white, and baby pink Hello Kitty velour tracksuit with a matching trucker hat, Rachel stands in my sister’s preteen hot pink bedroom. In the background is a plastic neon beaded curtain in the doorway, a plush cheetah bulletin board above her desk from Claire’s with a KISS 108 bumper sticker, and magazine cutouts of Nick Jonas. We can practically smell the Sweet Pea body spray through the photo. It holds dear a memory of the hours the three of us spent together in that room with a CD in the boombox or a VHS playing on the little silver TV we weren’t allowed to get cable for. We hold the photo close to our faces to find all the details of our past selves.
I leap from my place on the floor, down the stairs, the cement of the basement cold through my socks. I find the plastic bin I keep down there in storage and bring it back to the living room. It’s not because of the wine, I would have done this anyway. I can never say no to nostalgia. From the bin, I pull out more childhood photos and photobooth printouts from the mall. Tickets from movies, dating back as far as 2004, their titles barely legible now. A book of cartoon doodles, an American Girl Doll recipe book. A thick envelope full of notes my sister and I scribbled to each other. My sister reads them out loud, and my house fills with the sound of our harmonized laughter. After reading letters from past boyfriends and finding old magazine cutouts that used to be taped on my own bedroom walls, I find a booklet made of construction paper. It’s a birthday card Rachel made for me when I turned 14. Crayon drawings and paper levers to pull to reveal inside jokes we forgot about.
“Wow, we were so creative,” we laugh, looking down at all the things we drew and hand-wrote and glued. The amount of time and care we put into something to make the other laugh, or to be playful, or to say something nice. There are things we suddenly remember that are now lost, that we wish we could find, like how every year my sister and I would make Rachel a happy birthday video with video clips from the internet, a week-long process of editing and cutting and downloading footage illegally off of YouTube.
“We were so weird,” I say.
“Well, yeah,” Karylle says. “We were homeschooled.”
As a fellow homeschooled freak I salute you 🫡
Wow, I love this Kailey! Sorry it’s born from hard times. But it’s so vulnerable & so alive. ❤️