14,401 kilometres

Distance is difficult. I should be used to it by now, having lived for two years in Scotland, and now almost two years in New Zealand. Things happen back home while you're away. Lives carry on. People change. But I'm so lucky that my relationships with the people I love don't change. We all know that a day or a week or a month or two without communication doesn't alter anything. We can pick up exactly where we left off quite easily. The reason for this is that we have had the time to build relationships that will last. We know so much about each other, and have shared so many experiences. We've had ups and downs, laughter and tears, and we've weathered it all to create a lasting bond with each other.

Such relationships don't form overnight - not so much those with our immediate family, but friendships in particular take years to become worth holding on to. That's what makes them so special.

What I've been learning over the past couple of months is to be patient. I'm in the midst of a brand new long-distance relationship. The Boy and I had only really been together for eight weeks before he left NZ for NYC, and he has now been away almost twelve weeks. I've been struggling lately with having to accept that we are in a holding pattern, with no real progress being made while this distance (14,401 kms..) is between us. To use The Boy's term, we really cannot expect our relationship to 'deepen' until we are back together in the same city. Do you know how hard it was to realise that?

It would be nice if the only thing separating us was this bridge...

 Henri Silberman

What is amazing to me about this is that we are still making it work! It is hard, believe me. Probably the hardest thing I've ever had to be patient about. This ain't no staring at the presents under the Christmas Tree and knowing you can't open them for another five sleeps... This is doing what I've always done - waking up alone, going to work, coming home, making dinner for one, and going to bed alone for another nine weeks (yep - currently Wednesday, 1st December is the date to get excited about, though ignoring the fact that I might be jinxing myself by writing this - it could be a couple of weeks later again.. sigh..) - but knowing there is a gorgeous boy coming to join me at the end of it. Impatience actually doesn't even come close to the way I'm feeling! There have been tears and frustrations - on my end of course. I am the one still going about my day-to-day life, being well behaved and saving my money, getting ready to move myself to NY next year. The Boy has somehow been able to flick the 'pause' switch without too much trouble.

What makes me smile is that we are still both happy to be patient, and wait until we are back in the same city again to pick up where we left off. How exciting! We haven't had time to get to know each other properly, but we also haven't had time to get sick of each other yet. What we have had time to do is decide that this is something worth waiting for.

So no more 'are we there yet? are we there yet?' from me. Rather, I'm getting the ball rolling by starting to make contact with people who can help me find work in NYC. Speaking of which - I welcome any and all suggestions from you girls (Katie, Ally...!!!)