I know it’s September, which means we’re officially in Autumn, but the gorgeous, summer like, weather this week has me holding onto summer for as long as I can. You see, this summer has been a great one – it’s everything I was hoping for and I am finding it hard to say goodbye to it.

I went into summer filled with excitement and anticipation. It was going to be jam packed with many, long overdue, reunions. I knew I was in for some fun times, adventure and lots of love, but never did I think it would be a summer of rediscovery.

For the past year or so I have felt a little ‘meh’. I was in a funk. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy and enjoying each day for the little (and sometimes big) moments of joy that came with it, but, something was missing. There were moments where I just couldn’t find my mojo.

This summer, something shifted and I discovered that what I was missing was my spark. I didn’t get that that’s what it was until I felt it come back.

By hanging out with my family (both blood and chosen), I remembered who I was. It wasn’t a purposeful search – it just happened. In talking about shared memories; our childhoods; people and places we all knew; not having to explain myself – I realised this was something I was missing. That short cut language you have with people you have known forever. I spent a summer using that language and the more I did, the more I felt like a flower coming into bloom.

I realised I was “Sarine” – both in name and in mind. I was their (mad) Sarine/Sar/Sarina. Belly laughs were had about things that usually just go misunderstood (over here); we could annoy each other but then also love each other, so fiercely, at the same time.

Living away from home, you don’t even realize that you have put up a protective wall around your heart. Not to keep others out but to make sure you don’t always long for the people and times that you can not have. You can not go around being homesick for the people you are not with all of the time – it would break you. Yes we are in very frequent contact (voice notes, text messages, phone calls, video calls, and any other way that technology will allow) but there is nothing like the human touch and being in each other’s company. This summer, there was lots of that.

We got to do the simple things like go for walks together; go shopping; see a movie together at the cinema; have an Italian style dinner in my home; long chats on the couch – my couch, in my house; hang out with my kids and make memories with them. We also got to do some incredible bucket list things too. It was all so precious and wonderful.

I have been on such a high for the past three months. Even after the tearful goodbyes, my spark has remained. I have been so used to going without for so long, that I thought I could just keep going but sometimes, if you’re lucky enough, you don’t have to.

Here’s to that spark and the people who remind us of it, and, help lead us right back to ourselves.