One of the first times I returned home after I moved out, I stood at the front door wondering if I should knock or just walk in. Once inside the house, I felt awkward. I asked my mother for a glass of water. I felt uncomfortable helping myself.

I walked to the end of the hall near the bathroom and peered into my old bedroom. The room looked nearly empty. Instead of my white, gold-trimmed furniture crowding the room, a single oak bed stretched out from one wall. Delicate straw butterflies replaced my picture of a Victorian girl reading her book and my picture of a white peacock peering over its shoulder. I turned from the room, feeling sad and strangely empty.

Life had continued for my family, and I no longer felt like one of them.

I had expected to return home and find everything the same as before I left. Of all the things I had prepared myself for during that mystical walk from childhood to adulthood, my dejection over my changing family was one I had least expected. The thought of separation had never occurred to me. How could a family that ate, slept and lived together for more than 18 years suddenly feel like a group of strangers? How could I sit across from my my mother, listening to her recount her activities of the last few weeks, and feel the gap between her life and mine?

When I returned to my apartment and went to bed, I often thought back to my childhood. Closing my eyes, I pictured the days when my brothers and I played together in the backyard. I remembered the day we had found a box full of my dad's broken watches while rummaging through the basement, looking for things to bury as hidden treasure.

I thought of the forts we had built in the blackberry bushes surrounding our yard. We were proud of our secret place where no adult would dare tread.

I thought of our trips to the nearby park where we had played tennis or basketball in the golden glow of the setting sun on warm summer nights. I though of when my brothers had tried to teach me karate after watching "The Karate Kid" and how we tried to record the theme song of "The Never Ending Story" after watching the movie.

I thought of when we had dressed in black, covered ourselves with mud, tied branches to our waists and played survival in the dark.

I thought of the times when I had screamed at my brothers when they teased me by calling me "Tyana Banana." I thought of the times when we marched to the creek in our backyard and tried to catch crawdads and water skippers. My brothers told me to not go into the creek barefoot because the crawdads might think my toes were hot dogs and try to eat them. They had made me deathly afraid of crawdads.

I had stared at the dark ceiling, my hands beneath my head, and thought of my childhood until I began to sob. I turned over on my bed and buried my head in my pillow. The tears had felt hot. I regarded my lonely little apartment with disgust. "So this is adulthood," I said to myself. "This is what I was in such a hurry for." I cared very little for adulthood now. What I really wanted to do was call my mother and cry and beg to come home and return to the past.

But the past was beyond reach. One brother and one sister already had married. My younger brothers were nearing graduation from high school. Nothing could ever be the same again. Sometimes, the loss felt overwhelming.

Although I thought I never could be as happy as I had been in the past, I slowly became used to the changes in my life. I began to see the people my brothers and sister had married as pleasant additions to my family rather than tools that wedged my family apart. I realized that each person in my family still loved me, and I loved them.

Although we occasionally saw each other, my family began to become my best friends. We became used to the changes in each other's lives. The pains and joys of adulthood caused us to love each other more and respect who we had become. The discomfort and strangeness faded until I felt genuine joy at the differences in our lives.

My memories have lost their painful bite and turned into a gentle ache.