In Spain's case, our adherence to what was then the European Community was the culmination of a yearning by successive generations cut off from the possibility of joining the broader current of peace, democracy and progress that was flowing north of the Pyrenean border.
This is the kind of change that Nigeria has been yearning for.
There is too, a sense of yearning in the album, which includes a Johnny Cash-like ballad about the women's prison, Holloway Jail, and blues about never going "anywhere south of Delaware, never saw a Kentucky moon".
Which is all well and good – that song is a classic – but Wood seems to have forgotten about 2013's two stone-cold Christmas bangers in the shape of Kelly Clarkson's warm hug in musical form Underneath the Tree, or Leona Lewis's yearning One More Sleep.
What they have in common is that they are tapping into a nostalgic yearning to go back to basics.
Along with the standard politician's urge to be liked, there is, I think, a second yearning – the columnist's itch to be interesting.
But Barbara Castle fixed a deal, she managed a crisis: she didn't honour those women's yearning for respect as skilled women.
We became friends for many reasons – but perhaps one of the most striking connections is the mutual experience of yearning too long for a country built through the memories and idealised pictures painted by our parents.
From 1 January next year, atheists yearning to slip on a woggle and embrace the self-reliant yet altruistic philosophy of the Scouts will find the organisation well prepared.
He tries to find his way back to the site of the crash, charting every step he takes, yearning for the family he left behind.
As for potential candidates, their felled London giant Vince Cable has shown no sign of yearning to rise from the ashes of Twickenham.
