We are too nostalgic to enjoy the present

PalmIn an hour, I'll yearn for this moment. It happens to me all the time; it's like receiving nostalgia in advance. Only when it happens—and that makes it unattainable, nonreturnable—will I value this present I find myself in now. I'll think with melancholy, I'll romanticize it, even though I'm in a hurry now and it seems dull. I'll tell myself that I didn't savor it, that I should have enjoyed it more, and that I wasn't aware of it when I still had time. And then it will all be memory and regret. A heavy burden that makes you fear that, in the end, the balance of it all will be that I didn't live long enough.

Sometimes, when I observe scenes from other people's lives, I tend to think that others are capable of experiencing everything to the fullest, that they are present and aware. On the street, in photos, or on social media, I can linger on every detail: I see where they are, what they're eating, what they're drinking, who they're with. I can almost feel like I'm living that moment with them. Now, when I want to do the same thing with my own life, everything fades so quickly that it makes me doubt whether I should hold onto dreams or memories. And another peak is that feeling of having wasted time, of not having made an effort to retain those sensations, to make them last longer.

Luckily, all of this seems more manageable when it's summer. From June to September, everything expands, becomes warmer and less bittersweet. And it allows me to delude myself into the perception that life takes longer to become memories. Having complete control over my schedule makes me feel like I haven't wasted so much time: if I've gotten up late, I can still go to the beach at noon, come home, shower, go to dinner, and, if we find the day hasn't lasted long enough, stretch the night out as long as necessary. Everything is more flexible, and space-time is more relative. For me, living becomes somewhat easier. I wonder if, perhaps, it's because I need more time than other people to digest things, if each moment shouldn't last long enough to, first, live it; then, be aware of it; and, finally, say goodbye.

When I'm enjoying myself, it's hard for me to say goodbye. I never have enough; I refuse to let the moment I'm living stop and send it directly to a corner of my memory. We're specialists in stretching out the hours: there's always another place to go, another round of drinks to order, another topic of conversation to start. That's why I love people who simply ask themselves, "So, what do we do now?" with that sense of continuity, of infinity. I'm especially happy when it's time to leave, but for me it's still early, and the other person confirms that they also want to stay a little longer with a "Don't worry, I don't have anything fast-paced." It's a pleasure to enjoy things when you thought they were over, like when you're at your favorite singer's concert and she pretends to say goodbye, but she still has half an hour left.

The passage of time, youth, and nostalgia are the themes Paolo Sorrentino explores in Parthenope, this ode to his extraordinary Naples. The beauty of the film, implicit and explicit, leaves you so stunned that you don't realize its message has shaken you until you roar to the end credits, without quite knowing why. "Life is melancholy. And you can't escape it even if you try to escape by gliding along the pleasant surface of existence," Gary Oldman –in the character of John Cheever– tells him, Parthenope –starring Celeste Dalla Porta. I think that if it's tempting to try to ignore existence, it's because we're afraid to experience everything, to let the moment trap us, to hold the present so tightly that it burns in our hands, to feel how time tries to flee. And perhaps with youth it happens as with people, that we don't want to hold on for fear of missing them.

This is one of the battles I try to fight against myself: to make the gratitude of having certain memories stronger than the sorrow of watching life pass by. And all so I can return to the moments when I've been happiest and do so with pleasure, not with regret; so that guilt doesn't cloud the experience of looking back; so I don't live in this constant sorrow as the years pass. For all this, I prefer to enter this present, close my eyes, and concentrate very hard to capture the precise moment that I know, in an hour, I will miss.