skipping down memory lane

I've been feeling rather nostalgic.

As I move closer towards a huge life change, I've been craving the past. Not just one moment in time when life was good and happy and seemed as it would stretch on that way forever, but for all of those little, happy moments that have made up my past. Each and every one I wish to relive and savor.

I realize that I'm romanticising the past. There were probably more downs than ups, but as you move forward, you forget the bad and hold onto the good. There have been many years of my life that have just plain sucked, but there have been moments sprinkled in there that have made everything worth it. Every single bad memory has been made up by the good.

It's in those good memories that I'm reminiscing over lately. It's much easier to remember those good than look forward to the unknown.

I do not do well with change. I am a creature of habit. I dread change. I fight it kicking and screaming. I'd do just about anything within my power to make sure everything stays exactly as it is.

But, I realize change is inevitable. It's a part of life. And so, I have to move forward. I have to make this change to better myself.

It just sucks.

I have moved once before. 10 years ago. 2000 some miles from north to south. In the middle of 6th grade and it was, by far, the hardest thing I have ever done.

I had lived my life with the same people since I was 4 years old. Gone through every milestone with them until then and leaving them behind was hard. Beyond hard. It truly is like leaving a piece of yourself behind.

So, I'm trying to relive those moments spent with them. Laying in the grass on summer days, trying to come up with something else to do. Crossing all the railroad bridges with them by my side. Biking all over creation. Running through sprinklers and careening down slip 'n' slides. Eating cherries off the tree in the neighbor's backyard. Dancing around streetlamps at night. Starting the first day of school with them to hold me down. Crying with them in the rain the morning I moved away.

Those sweet, hopeful memories of girls I loved as my own sisters. It's easy to savor them all - to want to go back in time and soak up their laughs, the smells, the heat of summer and the feel of prickly grass.

When I moved here, I never thought this would become my home. But slowly, over many years, it did become my home. It became the place I loved with people I loved even more.

The people are what makes the place - the friends.

The friends I have made here have become my family. Their families have become my family.

And they are what I will remember when I move away. I'll yearn for the days of skipping school. Sleepovers and drives to find Old Man Hawkins at 4 am. Laughing and dreaming. Parties (especially surprise birthday parties - see above) and dinners out. I'll miss it all.

I already do.