Homegrown friends...

Have you noticed how some things never change, how time seems to stand still when you are with some people. For instance, with the siblings and cousins there's a timeless ease... we have grown up, got married, changed over the years, yet, at the same time we haven't. It was the same recently when friends from home had come to the city. All those years spent under a clear blue sky practicing for the choir... the natural high that comes after singing, laughing, hanging out together... that simple feeling of being alive and in love with the world, that's how it was the past few weeks roaming around with homegrown friends (a Zac Brown Band pun).

The Saturday choir practice sessions, ganging up after Sunday mass and the caroling craziness: those are some of the best memories of home. Those days are always shrouded in warm hues of sunshine, I still remember the gentle evening breeze with its warm summer scents seamlessly mingling with the notes of As the Deer, You are my All in All, Shepherd of my Soul and the like. So getting back together with them after so many years felt pretty good... people tend to change in a decade, and we all sure did, but when we get together there's this ease of being, a camaraderie that flows effortlessly.

And maybe, that's what it means by being home... horizons may change and years may get in the way, but the people you feel at home with is where the light tends to stay.

Here's a slideshow of the atrocious number of pictures we took...