Tuesday 9 August 2016

distance

In January, I wrote as an Instagram caption: "Sometimes the people you love leave to have big adventures, and it's hard and awful and hurts like hell to see them walk away for the last time for what feels like forever. Thing is, you still are incredibly excited and happy for them."
Distance sucks, especially when you don't really know how you feel about someone in the first place. Distance leaves a helluvalot of room for speculation, for wondering and for driving yourself mad. Still, distance kinda gives you the chance to think about someone while not being influenced by them that much. It gives you the chance to see how much you actually like and therefore miss them, and to take a better look at what you actually hope to be for that person.
Distance makes friendships a lot harder. Distance, especially the time-zones-apart kind of distance really makes you see how much time you are willing to spare to talk to someone, and how much of their time goes towards you when they're exploring and adventuring on the opposite side of the globe.
Distance somehow makes a reunion so bittersweet that it almost hurts. I have a couple of friends that live train rides that sometimes last three and a half hours away, and seeing their faces light up when they spot me on the train platform makes up for the months we were apart, and still it hurts because I know after these few days I won't see them again for months.


A friend of mine recently returned from a year abroad, another one from a semester. Friends of mine are going to university a few hundred kilometers away and while I don't want things to change, they will. They will change over time, the way you behave around each other will shift - whether that's awkward silence when you see each other again because you haven't been involved in each others life and it feels off to share the same space on this planet again, or it's the excitement that's been bubbling in you since you made plans to see each other because oh god I missed you so much come here I'll hug you forever.
A lesson I've only recently learnt: sometimes it's the best to just let something go. People, relationships, dreams, things. Of course you should keep fighting for what you want, but sometimes it's better for you and any other involved party to realize it's time to quit. Distance can help realize that and make the decision, but it also can make it a whole lot harder. You've managed to keep at least somewhat of a connection going, so it's difficult to admit that somehow the line ripped off and you can't talk to each other anymore.
Distance is a weird thing: it rips you apart and sometimes brings you back together even closer, but sometimes the gap of a few months and a couple hundred kilometres stays the same, even after you've seen each other again. I guess it's not the distance but what you make of it.

2 comments:

  1. I truly love the way you write. Always poignant and beautiful.


    Nicole | explosive bagel

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    1. Thank you so so much Nicole! That means a lot to me!

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