I hear it often: “Vama Veche isn’t the same anymore.”
It’s said like a sigh, or a warning, or a quiet lament. And in a way, it’s
true. The bars have changed. The crowds are younger. The music’s different.
Some of the places we loved—Stuf, Canapele—are gone. Vama’s changed.
But I’ve come to believe something
deeper. Yes, the place has changed—but we’ve changed more. And the ache
we feel when we go back isn’t really about the beach at all. It’s about time.
The
Friction Between Identity and Time
What we’re describing when we talk
about Vama Veche is not just nostalgia. It’s the friction between who we
were and who we’ve become. It’s the moment we look in the mirror of a familiar
place and don’t quite recognize the person staring back.
In our twenties, we carried
lightness in our bones. We slept in tents, shared cheap drinks, didn’t worry
about back pain or alarm clocks or responsibilities waiting at home. We didn’t
just visit Vama—we belonged there. We were young and carefree, and the
beach seemed to rise up and match our rhythm. Now, two decades later, we visit
again. But something’s off. It doesn’t feel the same.
And here’s the hard part: we say
“Vama’s not the same” because it’s easier than saying “I’m not the same.”
That subtle deflection lets us hold onto an idea of ourselves that feels like
it's slipping through our fingers. We were spontaneous, joyful, wild. When the
place no longer brings out those traits in us, we blame the beach. But maybe
what’s really happened is that those parts of ourselves have become harder to
access—and that hurts.
Vama
as a Mirror, Not Just a Place
Places like Vama Veche are more
mirror than map. What we loved wasn’t just the sand or the sea or the late-night
guitar strumming. What we loved was what the place unlocked in us. It
revealed something beautiful—something raw and unguarded. Something young.
That’s why we return, over and over,
hoping the place will awaken that part of us again. But it doesn’t. Because
we’ve layered on years and roles and habits. We’ve re-entered real life. The
mirror still works—but the reflection is different.
The
Myth of the “Authentic Past”
Our minds are skilled at editing our
pasts into myths—clean, romantic, golden-hued stories. And when we try
to return, we’re not just chasing a place—we’re chasing the mythologized
version of ourselves that we left there.
Generational
Gatekeeping
There’s also a strange tension that
comes with seeing younger people living now in what we once called ours. They
sleep in the same tents, drink on the same beach, dance to their version of
freedom—and it can feel like they’re inhabiting our memories. Like they’re
trespassing in a sacred space.
But Vama Veche was never meant to be
owned. It never belonged to anyone. That was the whole point. It was wild and
shifting and free. And maybe what we’re really reacting to is this: the
baton has passed, and we weren’t quite ready to let go.
These
Places Only Exist as Long as We Can Afford to Live Outside Time
But eventually, time catches up. And
when it does, it claims both us and the places we thought were timeless. The
campfires burn out. The bars close. The people move on.
We return expecting magic, but find
Monday morning lingering in the corner of our minds. And it’s not the beach
that’s broken—it’s our ability to pause time that’s faded.
The
Grief We Don’t Name
What we’re really feeling is grief.
Not for a place—but for a version of ourselves we can’t quite be anymore. The
one who was lighter, looser, unburdened. The one who hadn’t yet been dulled by
the weight of responsibility, or softened by love, or hardened by loss.
There are no rituals for this kind
of loss. No funerals for our former selves. So we mourn sideways—by blaming the
beach, or mocking the new generation, or swearing off places that don’t make us
feel young anymore.
But maybe what we really want to say
is simple: “I miss who I was here.”
Honoring
the Memory, Not Chasing the Illusion
You stop trying to squeeze yourself
back into a younger skin. You stop demanding that a place deliver something it
no longer can. Instead, you remember it the way you’d remember a first love—not
with resentment that it didn’t last, but with quiet gratitude that it ever
happened at all.
Maybe you even find a new kind of
timelessness—not in the beer at dawn, but in your child’s laughter in the surf.
Not in the sleepless nights, but in the slow, quiet mornings with the people
you’ve chosen to grow older with. A different kind of magic. A different kind
of freedom.
And maybe, just maybe, that’s what
growing up really means.
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