I feel a little old. My brother (my little brother, who arguably hasn’t been littler than me in years) graduated from college this weekend. We all had a great weekend up in Syracuse, laughing and walking and eating and sitting and just being together. It all snuck up on me by surprise, because one minute I was at work, teaching a computer class and trying to pretend that I didn’t feel sick but instead felt completely healthy, and the next, I was in the car with my sister getting onto the Parkway and going over the directions. How did this happen? When did we get to the middle of May? Where did the last few years go? I’m not too sure. I do know that I am beyond proud of John, and that I know without a doubt that he’s going to do some great things one day. I also know that I took a million pictures of the weekend, and my parents and siblings were all quite patient as I continued to try to take more photographs of people and not just wacky close ups of the ground and strange angles of buildings. (But I got a few of those, too.)

I was going to write something about how I got all teary-eyed during some of the hokey speeches, even as I was thinking about how hokey graduation speeches always are. I was going to say how I can’t believe that my sister’s graduation was two years ago, that my own graduation was FIVE years ago, and how I can still remember the electricity of those last few days, that completely unforgettable feeling of too many emotions all crashing together.

Things change, things stay the same. My little brother’s all grown up and it makes me feel all funny. In a good way. Here are some of my favorite photos from the weekend.