Do you ever feel like a bit of a throwback?

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I wasn't sure where to put this. I'm not sure whether it's because of my Asperger's, because of how I was raised... whatever. But I often feel as though I am a throwback. One of my most persistent interests is the Victorian/Edwardian age. I love studying the history of it, the lives of the men and women who built the British Empire, the United States, etc. And I feel more of a connection to the people of that era, to men like David Livingstone, Charles George Gordon, Rudyard Kipling, Winston Churchill, Charles Darwin, and Ernest Hemingway than I do my own contemporaries. I like the rules of that age, propriety, the idea of manliness that has more to do with courage and dignity than being a pickup-truck driving yokel, the idea of building something great (an empire, a company, a nation) and being part of that process than the hedonism and self-indulgence of our own age. It's funny, because politically and philosophically, I am rather liberal, but I feel more of a connection to 19th Century British Tories than I do Labor or the American Democrats.

I'm just curious if I'm fairly alone in this little eccentricity or whether others out there might feel the same. I often feel rather lonely in this, and I think it contributes to my sense of isolation.

Wrong, you're a step forward.

compared to the median common denominator, Aspergers is different in that:
-increased intelligence and productivity when focused
-Highly self aware and CAPABLE OF POSITIVE SELF-DEFEAT (ask an NT to go through our experiences and still be able to put their s**t on the shelf).
-Attentive to suffering, willing to help and smart enough to do so.
-Far less prone to being exploitative.
-Does not contribute or listen to the lies/phychoses/faslehoods/propagandas that have led whole societies to anything up to and including genocide. Especially the successors of the Anglo-Saxon group...

Sounds like a pretty sweet package to me man. I admire those same names (minus any associated with starting/aiding war) but it's very possible that our step in evolution was taking place amidst that era as well; 2-300 years is a very narrow timeframe.

I feel that I'm a throwback to the 1960s. I feel that I should have been born in the 1940s 0r very early 1950s as a boy of course. I'd rather dress the way that The Kinks did between 1964 and 1967 than live for today in the present. I also prefer vintage TV shows and TV sets from the mid 1950s to the mid 1960s over the TV sets from the late 1960s to the present day. I also prefer the Top 40 music of the Mid 60s than the Top 40 of today. If people don't like me or my clothes, they don't have to look at me or read any posts that I make about fashion. I have the right to make myself happy.

I Used to think I was born 30-60 years too late, now I wonder its the oppsite as meny of the types of intrests and beheaviours I displayed 7-10+ years ago and got bullyed and ridiculed for are now being displayed by the very same people who did that to me. I have setteled for the fact them i'm a trendsetter as opposed to a trend follower. Sounds good anyway.

This may sound weird, but I once was told that if you have an attraction to a certain era, you lived a previous life during that era and it was a life you really liked. Like, we have all these cool old wooden houses in downtown Sacramento, houses from like 1910-16 era, and I cruise the streets down there on Sunday afternoons which is when realtors hold their open houses, and I like touring the old homes. And I've always felt a strange attraction to the First Great Depression, I like surrounding myself with stuff from that era and my outlook on life is much more like somebody who lived in a much more moral time than our own. I went to a couple psychics who said that I lived in Chicago in a Victorian mansion during the GD, although they differed on what I did for a living, one thought I was a mobster while the other thought I was a doctor (maybe a doctor who treated mobsters?) and they said that that life had a big impact on me.

Wow, thank you all for responding. You've all got a very positive take on it.

Honestly, as far as the psychics go... well, let's just say that I'm not a fan. One thing, as irrational as it is, that I've always been attracted to is reincarnation. My grandfather, for who I'm named, died about a month before I was conceived. He was a very old-fashioned man himself (For his time. He dressed and spoke like it was 1880 when it was 1940). I never knew him, but I've always been interested in him, more so since I have a sneaking suspicion that he was on the spectrum. After all, he was immensely serious and very quiet. When he did speak, he was extremely formal (He called his wife madame). He was absolutely obsessed with springs and metallurgy and turned that into a lucrative and respected career at a spring factory.

Anyway, I don't believe in psychics, and honestly I think you were conned. Psychics are fairly talented at reading people and drawing people out. So they manipulate you into telling them everything they need, and they use it against you. It's sad.

That said... reincarnation... interesting idea.

I would like to add I also consider 'psychics' in general to be a bunch of BS but I think the concept of reincarnation makes a lot of sense and while I have no undeniable proof everything I have learned is consistent with the vague, foggy 'memories' I had as a female in the 1960s-1970s. I have researched the style of houses in that area and time and it is completely consistent with what an average house looked like (even with the ugly brown wallpaper). Another thing that's interesting is that I was born almost 9 months after my Great Grandmother died and wasn't planned either. People who knew her have told me I'm practically her clone. Eerie especially when I felt more 'female' as a young child (you can imagine how much bullying that led to) and how skilled I have with large groups of children and I recently learned she had 14 kids! Maybe a co-incidence but quite interesting nonetheless.

I can relate with you there, although I'm a mishmash of many different throwbacks, but most relate to mid 20th century America and Europe with intellectual overtones from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Last week, I listened to the following kinds of music: '50s surf rock, '40s and '90s swing, '50s and '60s country, '50s rockabilly, and '00s metal. My usual taste in music is '70s and '80s rock. And man, I enjoyed all of it. I have had similar times where I'd take a day to listen to just Baroque, or just gypsy jazz, or just '80s new wave. Missing from this list is anything from 2010 onward, and much of anything past 1995.

My main literary interests are Shakespeare, 19th century American, British and Russian novels, and mid 20th century dystopian fiction and science fiction.

My favorite video games include: Civilization IV (a throwback to all human history, really), Bioshock (a throwback to the '30s and '40s art deco with mid 20th century Objectivist undertones), and Fallout 3 (a throwback to '50s culture and fears of communism and nuclear warfare).

I often joke with friends that I act like a 60 year old man, but in many ways that is the case.

This was the very first image that reminded me of my past life. I was 8 when I first saw this picture in a magazine and the year was 1983.

This is the image that The Kinks had in the January of 1964.