What some of the people above have written is great.
I think there is another element too to why you're thinking this way about your ex. It may also have to do with strong association we form in our younger days. If you form a strong emotion toward something, like a hobby, or toward someone when you are younger, then you spent long time without seeing that person or engaging in that activity, then when you suddenly start doing that hobby, or see that person, then your mind gets transported to how you felt when you were younger.
Perhaps it's also similar for you. So, since you had strong emotions back then, when you saw your ex and talked to her for the first time in 18 years, you were transported mentally and emotionally back to those days. Those days where your whole future was ahead of you, where you felt more carefree, where you aspired to get and keep something you couldn't.
Just throwing that out as a possibility.
Furthermore, I believe that love is a choice. Love is a verb, it's not something that just happens to you automatically - you have the power to choose who and what you love, and who and what you do not love. The warm, wonderful feelings you get from love is simply a product of your conscious or unconscious choice to love.
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