We just arrived home after a three-day weekend with family in Pennsylvania. While it feels great to be back in my house at last, being “home” in October was absolutely intoxicating.

Climbing around on the red rocks of the Tohickon Valley with my husband and sister, I couldn't get enough pictures. Water, orange and yellow leaves, gravel roads, shale cliffs. While I lived there I hardly took pictures of my surroundings, most likely because as a teenager I took it for granted. Really. Here is the driveway I traveled up and down every time I went to school, work, Doylestown, boyfriend's house. Alongside it, a road nearby:

This weekend was full of small details: weathered wood, leaves crunching, the algae-on-wet-rocks smell of the creek. I delighted in each picture I took, and even got my 10-year-old sister to bring a camera out as well.

In the end, though, the treasures on my SD card at the moment are the brief video clips. These capture the essence of walking, driving, even sitting on a protruding rock in the middle of small rapids in the Tohickon. I hope short clips like this will preserve as well the unique smell and feel of my original home. Overall, we had a delightful trip. It will be hard to return to work tomorrow, letting it all drift out of our minds to be stored in these pictures, both moving and still.