this is where we used to live

the walk back and forth to the tesco. scraping together a few pounds to rent a movie from the library to watch on our laptop. best to go with a television series, they last longer than just a single viewing. in 2007 we lived in this city.they're selling newspapers by the entrance to the train station, the guy with the flower stand shouting lyrically just as always. a few shops here and there have changed. we swear one road used to be a one-way going the other way, but mostly it's as familiar as it was five years ago. mostly though, it's the feeling of suddenly being twenty-four again that comes flooding back.it was a year we'll never forget, that we look back on really fondly. it was also a really tough year, and being in those streets made me feel like i was right back there, feeling trapped and staring down the barrel of what life would look like, stretching out, unchanging, the same every day. feeling trapped at twenty-four is an awful feeling to have. i'm thankful i changed. i'm thankful that wasn't the last adventure. i feel like a different person than that person, but in many ways the same.so a secret to tell you : you can go back. they say that you can't. but you can, and in an instant remember, and you can step into the body of that person that once was. you can get frustrated that you can't change anything now, with the perspective you've gained you know exactly what you would say to your old self, but can't. then you can realize that our past is just a story, many stories that combine to make us whole. and then maybe you can be really glad that you came back and remembered.taken in birmingham, england in july 2013, five years to the month after we left and moved back to canada.