It's Wednesday but it feels like Friday, largely because it IS friday - in as much as there's no work tomorrow, or the next day. Thanksgiving truly is the best thing about America. A long weekend! And I can spend tomorrow morning curled up in bed, smug in my warmth although it's cold outside, a late breakfast and large cup of coffee while watching something light and lazy on the television before driving over to J's family's for food and wine and more food.
Or, I could have been spending tomorrow morning like that, except I am an idiot.
Instead, tomorrow morning will be spent shivering against the cold as I drag my tired and weary self out of bed, drinking a quick coffee (but not too much or I'll need to pee) and eating something bland and boring that wont induce stich and then joining a load of other idiots in running 4 miles in sub zero temperatures. Thinking about it now, while also considering the warm alternative, this sounds like the worst idea anyone has ever had.
I don't even like running.
Like Crazy
Jeremy is out for the evening so I've taken the opportunity to watch something he absolutely would not tolerate. It's a film called Like Crazy and it's about a British girl falling for an American boy and the long distance agony that ensued. It wasn't the best film, but one thing is for sure - whoever wrote it had done long distane, and it brought it all back:
- the ride on the tube to the airport, where every moment is an anguish and a longing and a holding back of tears
- the wait to say goodbye, where everything in you wants the goodbye to be over and everything in you wants to prolong it forever
- the ride home on the tube where the seat beside you is empty, or full of a stranger that is not him, and the holding back (or not) of tears
- the crying in public
- the knowledge that your friends absolutely 100% think you're insane
- the excruciating failure of pragmatism
- the awkward late night phone conversations, where one of you is exhausted and the other is cooking dinner / about to go out for the night
- the first re-meeting that you've imagined and longed for but then it's there and it's strange- this odd reuniting and careful remembering
- the joy of remembering and reuniting
- the ride on the tube to the airport...
Long Distance is a remembered trauma that flows through me. Even when I tell our story and people remark on how remarkable we are, I nod and smile and make light. But really I'm remembering and reliving and wondering at how it ever happened. We did it, we survived, but quite how I'll never know.
It's been a while
And I don't know why, particularly. It's been a while since I've written much of anything. Work took off and I slowed down. I've been rather obsessively watching The West Wing, which I'm not sure I even like, and not doing a whole lot of anything else. It's problematic.
I turned 30 and that was awesome in most ways, apart from the turning 30 part, which I don't much care about beyond that I'm now IN my 30s, which seems older than I want to be. But turning 30 was a good excuse to make people celebrate and generally do what I wanted them to do - which meant demanding folks stayed the night and played taboo and ate too much cake, and I loved that. I should turn 30 more often.
There's been a Bed Bug scare at work, sending me into an inevitable paranoid spiral. Jeremy wakes up to me shining my mobile like a torch beneath the covers. He is not impressed. I tell him that I'm thoroughly justified in my paranoia. He tells me to shut up and go to sleep.
And still not a day goes by where I do not remember that I live in America. As in, I don't live in England. And I miss it, while not being entirely sure what I miss, besides my people, and baked beans and chocolate. But I do miss it. When I am there, every time I speak I am aware that I sound normal. When I am here I am aware I sound strange. I wonder when or if I'll ever not be aware.
I miss people. So many people. And not all of them are in England, but all of them are not here. And homesickness chases me, hounds me, and I can't shake it. Even when I think I've shaken it, it's there to surprise me. I don't know what to do about that.
I've got out of the habit of writing - of writing anything - and I feel the lack of it. I should try harder, more often, and watch less 'West Wing'... why don't they explain where the storylines go? CJ keeps falling in love and then he disappears and we don't know where and that's frustrating.
That's all.
I turned 30 and that was awesome in most ways, apart from the turning 30 part, which I don't much care about beyond that I'm now IN my 30s, which seems older than I want to be. But turning 30 was a good excuse to make people celebrate and generally do what I wanted them to do - which meant demanding folks stayed the night and played taboo and ate too much cake, and I loved that. I should turn 30 more often.
There's been a Bed Bug scare at work, sending me into an inevitable paranoid spiral. Jeremy wakes up to me shining my mobile like a torch beneath the covers. He is not impressed. I tell him that I'm thoroughly justified in my paranoia. He tells me to shut up and go to sleep.
And still not a day goes by where I do not remember that I live in America. As in, I don't live in England. And I miss it, while not being entirely sure what I miss, besides my people, and baked beans and chocolate. But I do miss it. When I am there, every time I speak I am aware that I sound normal. When I am here I am aware I sound strange. I wonder when or if I'll ever not be aware.
I miss people. So many people. And not all of them are in England, but all of them are not here. And homesickness chases me, hounds me, and I can't shake it. Even when I think I've shaken it, it's there to surprise me. I don't know what to do about that.
I've got out of the habit of writing - of writing anything - and I feel the lack of it. I should try harder, more often, and watch less 'West Wing'... why don't they explain where the storylines go? CJ keeps falling in love and then he disappears and we don't know where and that's frustrating.
That's all.
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