There are seasons in life when the world tilts, almost imperceptibly at first, and suddenly the familiar landscape looks different. You wake up in the same bed, eat your same morning breakfast, wave to the same neighbors across the cul de sac, yet something inside you has shifted. These past weeks have been that kind of season for me. It began with my neighbors, Todd and Heidi, and their two young children. They are the sort of neighbors you hope for but rarely get. The kind

The holiday season rarely arrives quietly. It brings memories that are sweet and heavy all at once. It carries the smell of childhood, the ache of people we miss, the comfort of familiar songs, and the pressure to make everything feel magical. The brain remembers all of it. The holidays are never just days on a calendar. They are patterns learned over a lifetime, filled with belonging, comfort, happiness, and hope. The quiet truth is that the same circuits that make this seas