Nostalgia isn’t only a hell of a drug, but it’s a hell of an addiction too. Chasing times when you last felt good or when you felt things were right. Getting in touch with old flames that you forgot that there were reasons you moved on from, until you read the painful endings as to why those connections died.
Having those rose-tinted shades aren’t always good for you.
I’ve traveled to 50 countries and lived in three. People are basically good, but the media shouters will try very hard to convince you otherwise.
I haven’t been to that many and I won’t say I’ve been to the other end of the spectrum. But, having been to other corners of the square, I’ve found that people are the same. There are wildly different cultural norms that can certainly be misconstrued as rude or invasive, but damn, the baseline human experience is so common.
We all think we need more money. We all know lots of people worse off. We all know several better off. We all celebrate births, marriages, and deaths. We all feed our guests to excess (not you, whichever Scandinavian country it is that makes guests wait in the other room while you have dinner). We all make liquor from anise.
The thing I’ve noticed is people who don’t have much, don’t really care if everyone around is the same. When they see others who are better off, suddenly they become dissatisfied.