Something changes when a person leaves his or her childhood family behind. I can't quite put my finger on the exact moment when this change occurred within my own life, but it's noticeable. Some call it maturing, growing up and leaving the nest, both very valid in their own terms; however, when does feeling emotionally isolated and disconnected from one's familial roots cross that "normality" barrier?

I call my sister every week or so to bug her about coming to visit me or let her know if I'll be in town anytime soon, and every time we speak it's interesting to measure the slow changes in her and my father's lifestyles. My dad's started working out, my sister's started singing and occasionally trying her hand at cooking; leaving me wondering how I myself must have changed these past three months and if I even fit into my family as the perceived role I was always accustomed to fulfilling.

Do families themselves evolve into these differing entities and relationships naturally, and we just don't register how much they actually transform over time until we're removed from our own? I've always considered myself to be close to my family, but at times I feel as though I don't even know who they are. What does a relationship with a parent or sibling mean to someone who's trying to identify his or her independent, individual self? What is this relationship supposed to mean? There's a degree of necessary separation that nearly every student has difficulty defining; there are those who flock home to Mother Goose every waking moment just as much as there are those who stake it out over Thanksgiving and winter breaks to avoid seeing their relatives. Yet, where is the appropriate balance, and more importantly, how do we define and satisfy that?

When I consider how much I've changed, and should be allowing myself the opportunity to prolong or increase that growth period, how am I supposed to interact with my past, the family and friends who don't necessarily equate into the same relational patterns within my new, adjusted environment and lifestyle? It's fascinating how I'd always anticipated that, coming from Littleton, going to school in Boulder would feel so close to home; how wrong I was.