On Distance

This is from an email I wrote a few weeks ago while I was in Paris:

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The other day as I hunched over my computer obsessively trying to focus... a beautiful day passing unnoticed outside, I overheard this Australian girl bawling into her webcam beside me.
It was a little distracting as you can imagine,
more like impossible to ignore.
It was her birthday.
Apparently right before I had gotten there she had fought it out with the internet guy to get a computer that had skype so she could call her friends and family.
Now as she tried to tell her parents what a good time she was having, the tears wouldn't stop.

Unable to concentrate, I was secretly listening in.
After her parents came her friend, after her friend came her boyfriend.
And after the quivering goodbye to her boyfriend...
came the shortest, most heart breaking sigh I have heard in a long time.

Then she gathered herself... stepped outside into the sun and carried on.

I know that sigh...

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As I´m sure many of you do as well.

My life has given me many new faces... but also many goodbyes in turn.
They never do get easier, but you learn to take it in stride.
Lament the separation.
Celebrate the memories.
Hope for the next meeting.

My parents say goodbye to Isaac my brother today. He returns to the US for another year of school.

I dedicate today´s post to connections of love, of friendship, and of family which stubbornly fly in the face of pan-global distances and pan-state differences alike.

May they remain to be renewed.