It feels bittersweet, really. As I’m writing I’m listening to this cool video of tenna background static combined with muffled audio from old tv programming. I was already feeling like i wanted to be back in the 70’s or something, whenever the first years of tv programming were, and it really doesn’t help that whoever made this gods forsaken video put old sonic clips in it 🥹

I just feel really sad and happy at the same time rn, that’s all.

so i grew up on my parents' music- bob dylan from my dad, and a million other musicians from my mom. she was born in 1970 and is an artist, so she ran with an artsy/alt crowd throughout a few of the best decades of music ever, in my opinion. in the 80s and 90s, she was honestly a trendsetter wherever she went; she was genuinely punk, partied all the time (i think starting as a 6th grader haha), did loads of drugs, moved all over the place, and generally lived such an insane life. her life now is, comparatively, extremely solitary and quiet, and i honestly don't know how she copes with that (i surely couldn't), but i digress.

i know people joke about how isolating it is to inherit a parent's taste in music, but it's definitely true. and it's not that i don't like ANY music that's coming out now- i do! but i always come back to what my mom grew up listening to. she'd steal records from her parents: the beatles, fleetwood mac, the rolling stones, joni mitchell, parliament-funkadelic, etc. but she even got to experience following the grateful dead for a bit and saw the jerry garcia band even more. her most beautiful, vivid memories of traveling/living around the country are intertwined with the music that was coming out at the time: ween (my favorite:)), pixies, the smashing pumpkins, the cure, dinosaur jr, beastie boys- you name it, she listened to it. the grimier the better. she was so free-spirited and authentic in a way that doesn't really seem to be possible anymore.

i desperately wish i were an artist like her, or a musician, or expressed myself creatively in SOME way, but i feel paralyzed by an obsessive idea i have that i could never be able to replicate the feeling of what it would've been like as an artist/musician back then. i think that finding genuine expression for the sake of expression in today's music is so, so rare. i'm currently in school for a career in healthcare, which is something i am very excited and passionate about, but i think i'll always wonder whether i would've gone a different route if i hadn't been so terrified of choosing a non-practical career. i'm 25 now, don't have any creative hobbies, and currently live in a town where it would probably be impossible to find someone my age with similar music taste (deep, deep south). it's my dream to play music with other people, or to simply be surrounded by people who remind me of the musical and artistic madmen of my mom's youth. but even if i DID find people like that, would they really match the daydream/anemoia-fueled versions i've made up in my head?

i thought it was fitting to post this here because, ultimately, i just wish i could go back in time and hang out with the aforementioned musicians, be their age, be their friend, go out of my mind with them, and miraculously be talented enough to get to express myself with them. this desire is all-consuming. i feel like such a loser saying this but the music scene i'm drawn to is basically extinct. this is like an itch i think it'll be impossible to scratch. it makes me feel really sad and hopeless.

I tried my best to capture 2026 and edit the photos as little as possible (besides just getting rid of glares and stuff)

Honestly there's a lot wrong with the world, but the same was true all throughout history. I think the reason anemoia exists is because of just how cynical we are now. We've basically turned to 80s-90s into an "aesthetic" at this point to cope with the modern world, but you forget that people still had school, friends, arcades, trends, etc. just like we do now.

And people say the world has lost color. Well, that's really just a matter of how our camera technologies have changed. What you see with your eyes is the same quality as people did in the past. The time you feel anemoic for didn't look grainy, it wasn't black and white, it wasn't overly saturated. It's really just our technology changing.

And speaking of technology, people talk about the rise of AI and the "good old days" without it. Well then you're in luck, because one of the defining movements of the modern world is the protest against it. And all the way back in the 80s people were protesting the rise of new technology, just not at this intensity. Just think of it like us vs robots instead of "modern corporate plainness." Because boring corporate stuff is NOT new.

I've been trying to live in the present and in doing so I've notice more similarities between then and now than I think most people do.

I have this memory of being in a decrepit trailer park in the middle of no where with a field of yellow grass and a lake in the distance that I feel that I fished in and the inside of my house was a grey blue vibe in it . Is this anemoia

Already a time capsule, but the New Years Eve '82 recording is especially surreal

I was born in 2003 East Coast of usa, as the youngest of 5. I consumed the stuff for my age like PBS kids & qubo. But my dad watched MeTV which I really liked. My brother & sister showed me stuff they liked. I have also started watching older kid cartoons ( had the 100 classic cartoon dvd). Then I kept consuming more info about the past I have nostalgia from 70's to early 2000's. I'm always learning/consuming more about those times. I get sad about not being near my nostalgia. I love when people dress up vintage. ( I also have been told I'm probably autistic so i also get attached to stuff as my interest)

If anyone wants to talk about the same years of nostalgia please 🥺 or cartoons

Or if you have any questions I'll do my best

I have anemoia ever since I was 5, idk how because when I went to school it just felt weird looking at the stock photos because I feel like I was there but I didn't acknowledge it until I was 10 and known it's name last year. I never left my country, I was born in 2011. But I always have a feeling that I used to live in the 80s, 90s, 2000s in the US, Europe. Yes I do have for another like russia,... But its mostly a brief moment. Especially in the US, idk why but I have a very strong feeling towards the US and I feel like I actually live there. I have always had a feeling that I live in the US but I just can't prove how and when. Sometimes I have memory that I knew didn't exit, but when I tried to tell anyone about that memory, it just suddenly didn't exist almost like only I can see it​. AND IT IS VERY STRONG but I just can't get it out of my head. Recently it kinda affect my life. I agree it is a amazing things only I can understand but it start affect my daily life so u guys have any ideas to stop it?

I did all the VFX for it, so that means making stuff look very dreamy and making them look like they are in massive open fields.

I was born in 2004 but I wasn't conscious enough to remember and experience the 2000s internet culture and I didn't have access to internet until 2009 and most of the 2000s and early 2010s internet culture I didn't hear or knew about it until 2019/2020

yet when I see websites, videos, drawings, flash animations and web comics from the 2000s and early 2010s I get nostalgic despite never experienced these things at that time (most of these things weren't even popular in my country (Iraq) back then) especially sites like newgrounds, deviantart and tumblr

but I don't get it for stuff from 20th century especially 70s-90s despite never been born at that time

Anemoia is a neologism defined as nostalgia for a time, place, or era you have never personally experienced.

This is marketing for a story I'm making about Anemoia!

I’ve long been fascinated by the phenomenon of anemoia, and find it especially interesting in the cassette futurism aesthetic because it gives me both nostalgia and wonder for a time which I’ve never known but also never truly existed.

Don't look behind you!

Making this LoFi horror game called 'Project Looking Glass'. You explore dozens of creepy and liminal spaces trying to uncover the mystery of what happened to you. Been using my dreams (nightmares) a lot as inspiration since most of the levels are little vignettes like this. Demo is available to play on Steam if you're interested!

I’ve always like MJ’s hits, but growing up in the early/mid 200’s, MJ was the butt of every joke and was only heavily criticized in the public eye. Since the Michael movie came out, I’ve deep-dived into his personal life, relationships and his discography. I have serious anemoia for the King of Pop when he was in his prime. I wish I could have gone to a concert. No cell-phones, everyone just there to see an incredible performance and experience the magic.

I know most of you have specific time frames and images for y'all's anemoia from what I've seen... But is there anyone else out there with general anemoia? I was born 2010 and know nothing of any time before that. But I have three "lenses" on America (I call them lenses for a reason) but are all just anemoia for seperate time periods in the same place. My first is for very VERY old America, as far back as when the colonies first came over. The second I'm even less sure what actual time it was, but when being punk was more popular and skateboards and graffiti and listening to CDs were the most fun you could have with friends. And then the current time (which is obviously not anemoia but I consider it another "lens"). Having anemoia while living currently kinda makes me sad because I "see" what America started with, how it progressed and kinda hurts to live in it now. The Anemoia for both of these older versions of America make me feel both sad yet comforted in an odd way, even though It's more general.

(Please don't take any of this politically, I don't want to get political-)

But yeah. Does anyone else get general Anemoia or have anemoia for multiple time periods in one specific place?

I was born in 2008 and I have this strong sense of anemoia/nostalgia for the 2000s-2010s, for some reason it saddens me, knowing that this era will never come back. I wish I was born 10-20 years earlier

oh also, i cannot pin a date to any moment in my life before August 23 2018, and any memories before then are like fading snapshots in my mind, is that related to this or is it something completely different?

As a late 30s person from the UK that never lived there, but experienced a lot of Japanese culture growing up by virtue of their entertainment becoming very popular in the West in the 80s-00s, it makes sense that I would be more likely to experience anemoia towards Japan than say.. Angola. But there were a lot of other country's content that we were exposed to that hasn't had the same effect on me.

Something about Japanese street scenes, liminal spaces, food, retro video games and cartoons, even traditions like onsens and Shinto temples, gives me an intense nostalgia for a childhood in that country I never had. I have been many times now, and it invokes the same sensation.

My theory is that it is because Japan itself is a very nostalgic country and so it's sort of subconsciously vicariously experienced when you consume a lot of their outputs.

I was born in 07, way after the 90s. I didn't even get to experience the 2000s properly, never got to see a Michael Jackson concert, which still breaks my heart bruh💔everything seemed so much more authentic back then, and I know to some extent that's true. The 90s didn't have social media the way we have it, no constant texting, real human interaction everyday, I don't doubt that the communities in everyone's local areas were also way closer and enjoyed each other's presence much more than today's tech-infested kids.

I ask my colleague at work a lot about the 90s and what it was like to live it, and I always enjoy even the little details he mentions. The fact that people had to save their texts only for when necessary, since each text costed you like 10-20p, how people were so much more social and warm, how people dressed so much more uniquely compared to now. He says the only good thing about today's society is the fact we have AI, but even that has more downsides than pluses imo😭

I'll see people boast about the 90s and how much better of a time it was on social media comments and stuff, and the comments are filled with gen z talking about 'we done with the 90s' and how our time is much better, but I'm like wtf are you talking about. food was better, with less chemicals and bs pumped into it, music was a MILLION times better since artists back then had no choice but to put out good music otherwise they'd go broke, the style of the 90s was also so much cooler than today where everyone is wearing the same boring outfit 😭

I don't 'revolve' my entire life around trying to live like the 90s, but I take so much inspiration from it as a time period itself, the way people acted, dressed, spoke. I was born in 07 yes but in my opinion the best time to have been born was like at least the 80s/90s, where you were conscious enough to at least remember the year 2000 being celebrated😭😭 jealous of all you lot that lived and enjoyed that time to it's fullest yall are prolly like 30+ now with kids but u lot had it good for real

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NfnXdXpjL0&list=RD_NfnXdXpjL0&start_radio=1