Base Camp

All, all, all of my light is for you / and home, home's anywhere you are too ~Missy Higgins - Forgive Me

Home. Is there no lovelier word? In my youth, I couldn't wait to get away from it, and in my nascent adulthood, with its transient nature, I cannot wait to return every holiday. It is the center of my closest circle of friends, the center of my existence as an absentee member of my family. It is the one steadying presence in my still-nomadic life. It may not always be that I call Allentown home, and if that day should come that I do not return, I will be predictably sorrowful. For now, though, it is the place nearest to my heart.

This past Saturday night, over 120 of my high school classmates gathered at a local bar for our five-year reunion. It had its predictably awkward moments, but overall, it was a fun night for catching up with old friends and acquaintances. There were the people who had really changed and the people who hadn't changed a bit; those who are in far-flung locales like Florida and Colorado and those who never left home. There were faces I recalled but could not name - and faces I didn't recognize at all. There were names I knew that belonged to faces I'd never talked to.

And then there were my best friends, both in the present and past sense. With the exception of one or two, we all made it home for Thanksgiving and the reunion, and as we migrate further apart from each other, we are recognizing the gift that it is for all of us to be able to be together on a given date. I think a lack of awkwardness is a measure of true friendship, where even silences are welcome and comfortable and eye contact can be sustained without being creepy. What I have always loved about my close friends is that we are able to catch up and hold real, meaningful conversations regardless of time and distance between us. I've raved about friends before, but you can never do it too much.

Here's to many, many more years of non-awkward conversation!