It's hard to describe the range of emotions I felt this weekend. First and foremost, I'm going to miss my Aunt Denise. Only lately have I come to realize the relationships that I missed out on until recently with some of my family. I've always been a little introverted, and I've been trying to change that. And lately Aunt Denise and I had been working on some family history. I really enjoyed hearing some of her stories, and I believe she enjoyed sharing them with me.

And then, I was finally able to put some faces with some of the names I've been typing in the genealogy section of my site. What's more I was able to talk to several of my Mom's cousins and show them some of the work I've made available here. And that was a lot of fun to be honest. Especially when some of them saw the old pictures I have here. I exchanged email addresses with several folks, and hopefully I'll be hearing more from them.

Finally, I couldn't help but feel a wave of nostalgia from time to time. And it was particularly powerful during the funeral itself when the preacher spoke of Aunt Denise as well as Grandmother and Grandpa Layne. All of those faces and all of the people I had spoke with over the last couple days... it just didn't seem so long ago, we were all kids. Oh, I wish I could just have peek at those days again. As far back as I can recall, until I was something like 25, I was always wished I was a little older for one reason or another; so I could stay up later, so I didn't need a babysitter, so I could drive, so I could get into the R rated movies, so I could drink, so I could get that break on my car insurance... who knew that all those milestones would come and go so fast and one day I'd be sitting at a funeral afternoon one gray late-winter afternoon wishing just as hard that we could all go back, if only for just a couple of minutes, and be kids again.