When we are young, we all dream about growing up and leaving home, creating our own lives, making our own choices with no help from anyone else. What we fail to think about is that with the excitement of having new experiences comes the fear of failure, the pain of leaving all that we have ever known and loved for something that may be the biggest mistake of our lives.

Today I sat and reminisced with my cousins about our antics as children. The practical jokes we played on my brother (butter on his doorknob)and our backwards sentences that we made up on road trips to Wisconsin Dells.

I don't doubt that I will always have my cousins, my sisters, my best friends. To be able to share my life with them is one of the most wonderful experiences. The memories are something I can never put into words. What we have is special. No one else can understand the humor in the pretend vomit we tried to trick our mothers with. While the reminscing is almost heartbreaking, as nostaglia often is, I am so excited to hear all of the new things that we can share as we get older and find our paths.

Everything changes, for better or worse. We need to embrace the change, make it work for us, and remember that wherever we go, we always have each other to come home to.