When you are around those who welcome you, let you be free to be you, it is the best feeling in the world.

Not just family. Though that is where it should start and endure until the very end of anyone’s life.

Experiencing this with friends is easy. This is where it turns, you collect them, change them, hold on tight to them as long as you can. You make new ones. You introduce them to each other. They like getting together with the other, too. Expand that circle but keep everyone in it as close as you possibly can.

Amazing, finding this with those who are more than just colleagues – the ones who become your friends, even if work wasn’t involved.

A bonus. The people who are just open and welcoming, no matter where you meet them.

All of this. Knowing it is free to be you – truly the way you are – might just be what we all seek to find.

~ Dawn aka Hat Girl