Home Again

 Herself speaks.

Last week, I made a pilgrimage Northward, and visited my parents and my siblings. I hadn't seen my parents since the Christmas right before The Plage, and my siblings for even longer.

It was a good trip. The travel was tolerable (with the aid of a Benadryl-induced sleep for all of the flights), and most of the public wore their masks uncomplainingly. Everyone was good: my father, calm and reassuring and organized as ever, regaling us with hilarious tales of his awful summer jobs in high school and college; my mother, with her love of words, knowledge of travel, and extensive contemplation of all issues political and societal; my brother, cheerful and tenderly thoughtful and ever-so-delightedly-in-love with his charming wife; and my sister, an exquisitely welcoming hostess, loving mother, and entertaining storyteller. My People. 

The hardest part about visiting My People, is having to acknowledge how much I miss their company. It is easier, in the face of distance, to overlook or to put aside those feelings -- and to come face-to-face with the reality that I so rarely see the people who are the most important to me, is hard. 

Sometimes, I think that I was destined to love people from afar. There is always time, and often distance (whether literal or metaphorical), between me and those I love. I am accustomed to it -- I don't know any other way. 

It's the way of the world.