1. https://bit.ly/3HDCj9B
2. https://bit.ly/3sBJxXs
3. https://bit.ly/3tqb6SO
4. https://bit.ly/3Kekb7T
5. https://bit.ly/3C8IyRw
6. https://bit.ly/3vFbSxR
7. https://bit.ly/3hAHvk8
8.  
9. Been snowing and icy bone cold days around here. Unusual weather for my new home in the Pacific Northwest, though the usual stuff for the east coast homes of my youth.
10.  
11. When I add to this the Thanksgiving week just past, I have a recipe for remembrance.
12.  
13. I am remembering frosted, sparkling blue sky, white earth days of my childhood when school could be closed for nearly a week.
14.  
15. The photo below is the iconic red mill from the town I grew up in, Clinton, NJ. A piece of the east coast oasis called the Garden State. I took this photo on one of those many snowy mornings that I decided to open up Dani & Johnny's (my favorite job at the time.)
16.  
17.  
18.  
19.  
20. When I moved, I unconsciously cut off all that had come before and still it sneaks in at the oddest moments.
21.  
22. Until recently I only knew one person from my childhood days. My friend J.D and I kept in touch, and as I loved him and his family fiercely then, now that we are grown ups I still love him and the beautiful family he has created.
23.  
24. The rest was not something I ever really thought about. when I moved 3,000 miles away from that place the only beings that kept me even remotely tied to it were my parents and younger siblings still living there and even this was only a paperweight of an anchor.
25.  
26. A few years after me they up and moved away from there. And that was really that.
27.  
28. Just about 16 yrs ago... but something has happened recently to open up those memory files.
29.  
30. It's called the internet and more precisely, Facebook.
31.  
32. That's right the one and only, nearly automated "blast from the past" manufacturing system. There, everyone and everything from your younger days (this is more or less true depending on your age range) is available in full color stereo. All in real time.
33.  
34. People spend lots of time discussing whether or not this is a good thing, a bad thing, or anything at all. (The artist formerly known as Prince, who is once again known as Prince, informed us some time ago that,"The internet is completely over.")
35.  
36. I, for one, decided to let all the judging go and simply allow whatever would happen to happen. This is what I found...
37.  
38. Been in touch with quite a few people from my school days. It's been interesting to check in and see what other's have been doing with their lives.
39.  
40. What is always much more interesting to me though, is to see who it is people are Being in their lives. While trading electronic letters and video chats have the ability to illuminate some pieces of the puzzle seeing someone in person is essential for me to fully grasp who they actually are.
41.  
42. Eventually I got that very opportunity.
43.  
44. There was a guy who's arrival in my world I remember well. His name was John and man, oh man, did I have the hots for him. (At that point in life I had stopped sharing this type of thing with anyone besides my journal, so this is truly a first admission.)
45.  
46. We sat near each other in honors English and I was happy for it. A whole new world of possible futures appeared with this new face. He was friendly and good looking, easy to crush on.
47.  
48. So I did... and so did a lot of other people. Once his dance card filled up we didn't spend any more time together really. Of course we stayed friendly, mainly because I don't think either of us knew any other way to be with people.
49.  
50. That's all I really remembered about him when he got in touch through Le Facebook.
51.  
52. As life would have it he started visiting my area more often. We made plans to get together on several occasions that didn't pan out. Then one plan did.
53.  
54. He was only a few miles from me and he invited me to dinner there. So I went.
55.  
56. We talked a lot (two Pisces it turns out.) We learned things about each other that we didn't care to ask in our younger years. We told each other the legends of our lives thus far and asked questions about how we were wanting our stories to end.
57.  
58. There is no single word to capture the experience.
59.  
60. At some point, time itself collapsed from every direction. I was in the hot tub on the back deck of his father's house (that looks a lot like the houses my friends' all had in high school) looking up at a fine dusting of stars (city lights are far enough away out there much like our hometown) doing what I had fantasized many times about doing so many years ago.
61.  
62. I was feeling good, feeling free, feeling powerful beyond measure. Feeling pretty much 17 and 33 at the same time.
63.  
64. Whenever time collapses for us, intentionally or unintentionally, we have a choice in how we proceed from there. When what was, what is and what will be all roll into one, the reality of Being is surely revealed.
65.  
66. I had the opportunity to know what it is to detach from an outcome I desire and simply know it is on it's way to me. (Be it now, in fifteen years or in fifty, it has already happened.)
67.  
68. I had the opportunity to feel intimate connection with another through a connection with myself then, now and forever.
69.  
70. Marveling at the moment he asked at some point, "What have we been doing the past fifeteen years anyway?"
71.  
72. My answer, "Stuff."
73.  
74. And ain't that the truth.
75.  
76. Thank you Facebook for your ability to make a bunch of "Stuff" have a real effect on who I am being, what I choose to be doing and what sort of life therefore, I am going to have.