There they sat on the shelf of my local international food store: Nutro wafer cookies. My lungs stopped working for a moment, and it felt like one of those movie montages where the actor is suddenly flooded with a million memories.
Lest you think these cookies are something amazing, they’re not. Imported from the United Arab Emirates and dirt cheap, they taste right around the decent level. But since most store-bought cookies in Tanzania were absurdly expensive or styrofoam-tasting, Nutros were often the best option. They showed up at every birthday party, every school Christmas feast, and in many a school lunch.
I brought home the package of cookies, set it on the table, and watched my kids’ responses. The sharp inhale, the sudden memories of a long-ago life – they felt it too.
Leaving Tanzania brought us many losses, and we have not missed these cookies. But what is missing are the reminders of their childhoods. Like Nutro wafers.
I recently chanced upon a digital photo album that instantly made me homesick. The pictures were nothing fancy, everything ordinary: Grace, Josiah, and Lily in Tanzania, playing soccer in our yard with Gil – a weekly, sometimes daily occurrence. The kids would pull on shin guards and cleats and run outside to our mostly un-landscaped, gigantic yard. Gil would set up goals under the eucalyptus tree, and the four of them would hoot and holler (and let’s be real, sometimes scream and cry) while the sky turned their profiles golden. A kingfisher, stray chicken, or a hedgehog might interrupt and necessitate investigation. They would play until I called them in for dinner or until the mosquitoes started biting, a little dirtier, a lot sweatier.
Perhaps everyone is nostalgic for childhood – their own or their children’s. But what makes me most sad is that my children now have no reminders of it.
