There was a version of me that measured time differently. My days were spent chasing the next dive, the next dance, the next unfamiliar street waiting to be explored. I carried little more than a backpack, salt on my skin, music in my bones, and the quiet certainty that the world was meant to be experienced before it was understood. I moved lightly through life, collecting sunrises instead of worries and memories instead of plans. I was, in every sense, wonderfully carefree.

Somewhere along the way, life asked me to become more than that girl. It gave me responsibilities, heartbreaks, lessons, and reasons to stay still. I don’t long to go back because life was easier—I long for the fearlessness with which I embraced it. These photographs remind me that she still exists somewhere within me, waiting for the day I learn how to travel lightly again. Do you ever miss the person you used to be?