When you set aside the pretense and get right down to the basics, the best views in life are those that include people you love enjoying each other’s company. All around the scene above, children are laughing and playing in the cul-de-sac. The sun setting in the background is really just that, background.

On any other day, I might have been disappointed that I couldn’t hop in my car and get to a decent vantage point to better capture the full beauty of this sunset. Not on this day. There was a time in this neighborhood, when our boys were younger, that a gathering of families in the street was common. Thankfully, a few new families with younger children have moved into the hood and it appears they might become common again.

I hope so. I’d like our girls to have a similar experience to our older boys, playing constantly in the streets with their friends and plotting how to talk one of the parents into an impromptu sleepover. I have missed weekend nights like this.

And that fire pit above could use a good workout with a couple of bottles of wine. Parents need their playtime together too. It’s been too long since the last one of those as well.

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