Between 2010 and 2020, our family moved seven times across three states. In the process, I fell out of touch with a lot of old friends.

Since getting back onto Facebook a couple of weeks ago, I’ve reconnected with some of them, and it’s been like a breath of life-giving air. The conversations I’ve had with them haven’t just reminded me of what beautiful people they are. They’ve reminded me of who I am, too, and who I still hope to be.

This poem by Longfellow nicely expresses the beauty of finding one’s own song again through the connection of friendship.

The Arrow and the Song

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

I shot an arrow into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.