No one really prepares you for the kind of homesickness that comes in adulthood. Not for a place, but for a moment in time. A version of life that no longer exists. You don’t realize it’s happening while you’re in it, but one day it hits you—hard. You’re not missing a house, or a street, or even a person. You’re missing a feeling. A way of seeing the world that only existed when you were a kid.
I think about those nights sitting around the campfire, way past our bedtime, bellies full of marshmallows and laughter. I think about the sound of my dad’s silly jokes and the comfort of falling asleep on the couch, only to be gently carried to bed without a single worry in the world. I think about the long summer evenings running wild through the neighborhood, playing manhunt and ding-dong ditch, climbing trees and building forts out of anything we could find. We felt like kings and queens in a kingdom of dirt roads, trailer parks, and imagination. That was freedom.
Our parents were our superheroes. Our biggest problems were scraped knees or the possibility of a sandwich we didn’t like in our lunchbox. Pinky promises were sacred. Hopscotch and double Dutch filled the sidewalks. We’d spin around on carnival rides, tummies tight with popcorn and cotton candy, grinning so wide it hurt. We’d chase the last bit of sunshine on beach walks after the drive-in, searching for poutine stands that stayed open late. Sticky fingers from melting ice cream. Sun-kissed noses. That glorious smell of sunscreen and campfire smoke.
And then time passed.
We got taller, quieter. The world crept in. Life got loud in different ways: bills, anxiety, grief, heartbreak. The monsters we once imagined hiding in closets turned out to be real, and sometimes they lived inside the people we trusted most. Sometimes they lived inside us.
That’s the part that no one warns you about, the moment you realize you’ll never feel that kind of magic again. Not exactly. And worse, some people never felt it at all.
That thought sticks with me. Some kids were never tucked in safely. They never had late-night beach walks or games of manhunt or parents who made them feel like the world was safe. Some kids were forced to grow up way too soon. Life never slowed down long enough for them to just be a kid.
And that’s what gets me most. Because I miss that time with all my heart—but at least I had it. Some didn’t. And I’d give anything to go back and let them borrow a moment of mine.
So if you had that kind of childhood—hold it close. Let it remind you to be gentle, to stay a little wild, to find magic in the ordinary. And if you didn’t—please know, you deserved it. You still do.
