This-n-that

I'm in Pennsylvania right now, helping a friend get ready for her wedding on Saturday. Nicole and I have been good friends for about 4 years now, through all kinds of circumstances, and this visit is continually bringing up memories of "how things used to be." Just being with her, staying at her house like I've done before, and talking over our shared memories is a trip to a previous life. It brings up in living color the other people who formed our initial tight-knit circle, and the good times that we had with them. It's tempting to look back with a bit of a sigh. But Nicole and I decided that, as good as that was, and as different as our lives now are from what we anticipated then, we wouldn't trade what we have for what we had. That was good, this is good, and the next phase will be good. Life flows on. And we're happy about that.