Waiting for the phone to ring.

I'm waiting for Jeremy to call. This isn't unusual - Time Difference, being decidedly against me, means phone calls have to be pre-arranged and I have to be finger-poised, ready to answer less the ringing awakens some poor housemate / long-suffering couch-lender.

Relationships via phones are not much fun. The majority of the time, we talk about 7pm EST (12am GMT), when Jeremy is cooking & eating and I'm half asleep.

This is an average Hannah-Jeremy conversation:

Jeremy: "What's up"

Hannah: "Nothing"

----- Silence -----

Hannah: "What's up with you?"

Jeremy: "Nothing"

------Whizzing / whirring / crackling noise ------

Hannah: "What's that noise?"

Jeremy: "Oh I'm just making some pasta / baking bread / making mozzarella / [insert obscure and complicated food making process]"

Hannah: "Cool"

----- More whizzing / whirring / crackling -----

Hannah: "So what happened today?"

Jeremy: "Nothing - was at work"

Hannah: "Yea, me too - pretty dull - don't have much to say really"

Jeremy: "Sweet"

Hannah: "Huh?"

Jeremy: "What?"

Hannah: "I said I didn't have much to say and you said sweet. You're not listening are you?"

Jeremy: "Sure I am"

Hannah: Hmmmm

------ Sound of Jeremy's jaw clicking as he chews -----

Hannah: So ummm I'm pretty tired. Think I might go to bed now

Jeremy: Ok cool

Hannah: Night then

Jeremy: Yup. Love you.

Hannah: Love you too.

The problem with phone relationships is there's no room for coming home exhausted, kissing hello and crashing on the couch in amicable silence. There's no room for silence. So on the frequent occasions that neither of us feel like talking, the relationship has a feeling of emptiness, and as I put down the phone I worry we'll have a marriage of silence with nothing to say to each other. I know it's not true, but no matter how sternly I talk to myself, the feeling I have when I put down the phone feels like a status declaration of the relationship.

Of course we do have good conversations. There are times when one or both of us is feeling talkative and we can happily chatter away for hours (always at the expense of my under-eye shadows). But on the whole, the phone is a necessary evil and I don't think either of us will be sad to say goodbye to it. In fact, I may refuse to speak to Jeremy on the phone ever again - I'll certainly forbid him from talking and eating / cooking on the phone for all eternity.

I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to coming home to Jeremy cooking me dinner (!), being able to kiss him hello and demand hugs at awkward times during the meal preparation (an endearing trait of mine) and just knowing from looking how each other's day has been. We'll talk of course, but only when we want to and not during food processing. I. Can't. Wait. And thank goodness I can't wait, because if I wasn't feeling so top-of-the-moon excited about sharing my life with Jeremy in the same time-zone / continent / house, I'd be sat in a corner crying my heart out about saying goodbye to my friends and family. Buzz kill? Thankfully not - that's how excited I am. Good thing. Phew.