Monday Musings...

To talk of old times with old friends is the greatest thing in the world.
-Will Rogers

It's been little slices of heaven the last couple of weeks.

My in-laws were in town, then I traveled out of town to and got to see some old friends and then this weekend had some other dear friends come to visit.

It's been "Old Home" week, as my Mississippi grandmother would say.

These are all people I miss dearly, miss the more local interaction I had with each of them when we all lived in the same town. It has been a deeply felt loss to not be living our lives alongside one another geographically any longer.

But there is a bit of the mysterious in getting to have these little pockets of time with people I have known and loved so well.

When I look in the precious faces of my visiting loved ones, I am struck with how I have memorized them, how I can anticipate so strongly the next gesture that will follow, the cadence of speech, the twinkle in an eye. When I sit chatting with each of these people, I know that I will come away refreshed, renewed, inspired. And I know that as they are looking at me, as they graciously play attentive audience to my silly stories and meandering philosophical ponderings, that they too have committed me to their hearts.

It's a sweetly comforting thing, to feel that the spirit in each of these dear friends is so recognizable, so known to me, familiar, well-trod pathways of friendship and relationship comfortable beneath my feet in this journey. And it is so powerful to know that while miles now separate us, and if the Lord tarries, that the confines of time may one day separate us until we are all called home, I carry the contours of these amazing people's hearts with me everywhere.


I do love to take my pictures of these long-distance compadres, I do love our frequent phone conversations and emails.  But to talk face to face, to be able to anticipate the next burst of laughter, to see the track of a tender-hearted tear make its way down the well-known  crinkle at the corner of a beloved eye, it is both a chance to learn anew and to also memorize again the poems of colloquy and countenance, tone and turn of phrase.


Old Home Week.


One of my favorite events.


So what do you notice when you get to spend some time with an old friend?  Do you see the way things have changes or do you bask in the memories and the familiarity?  What makes you feel like you're enjoying a piece of Old Home pie?  Write your thoughts in a post and put the url of that post, along with your name in the Mister LInky's box below, or put your thoughts in comment form.