As a college freshman, my whole life is new.

Not only am I surrounded by all new people, but I’ve also moved to a whole new city on the other side of the country. In short, my life now is as radically different as could be from the one I was living just three short months ago. The people I see everyday wear different faces, and I have a new group of friends that hear about my daily happenings. When scrolling through the people I have texted most recently, I noticed that the people I knew from home were moving farther and farther away from the top. In some cases, it has been months since I’ve had a true conversation with the people that I used to see everyday.

In the last week, I’ve made a solid push to try and reopen those lines of communication. I texted friends I haven’t spoken to since leaving home, and I facetimed with an even older friend that’s now in college as well. I sent emails to the teachers I was close with in high school just to update them on my life, and have gotten the same from them. I’ve made plans for an old friend to visit as well, and I can’t wait to share with her the comings and goings of this new life I’ve made for myself.

It’s easy to feel as though home is hundreds of miles away, and in some cases it literally is, such as for me. But while in distance it can be far, modern technology lets us keep in touch like never before. Texts are instant messages and only take ten seconds to send, so why don’t we send more of them? Texts that are actually meaningful, by the way. And while it doesn’t always seem meaningful to merely ask about someone’s day, it can feel so good to receive those out of the blue from people you’ve fallen out of touch with.

I’ve recently figured out that you don’t have to be home to feel as though home is there. All it takes is an email, or a text, and it feels like you’re not quite so far away. There’s no more powerful reminder of who you are than the people that know you best. New friends are amazing things, but there’s something so comfortable about falling back into place with old friends.

I guess what I’m trying to say is not to get so caught up in becoming the person you are that you forget the person you were, and the people who helped to get you here. Home is only ten seconds away, if you want it.