Some small measure of peace...

dad says:
so, how are you?
Still Water says:
I miss you guys
dad says:
what brought that on?
Still Water says:
The blog
dad says:
ah - yeah.. the latest post?
Still Water says:
*nods*
dad says:
yeah, I miss you too.
dad says:
more than you know.

R+D says:
I miss you
Still Water says:
I miss you too

I guess what I wanted to say here is that no matter what, there's always going to be someone thinking of me, and missing me. And I'll be missing them. It's been a little over five months since I moved into the residence hall here at IUP, thinking it would be a nice change from the house, with my sometimes annoying little sisters and my constantly nagging mother. In those five months I've been home twice on weekends when Rick happened to be going up north for something, plus a break for Thanksgiving and another at Christmas. Suddenly, that feels like far too little time.

I've been feeling more and more left out lately; I'm not being included in the life of my family any more. They talk to me, on occasion. Mom emails every week or so, dad calls... sibling 1 doesn't speak to me unless I speak first, which proves difficult with my tendency to get distracted by other (often less important) things. She herself is growing up quite well, and at times I am jealous of how she's turned out, because she is an outstanding young woman. I have no doubt that she will succeed in whatever she decides to do, and I'm proud of her for it, even as I look on slightly envious that she somehow managed to pull her life together faster than I did mine. Sibling 2 has chatted with me recently, and appears to miss me at least, but she's only 13 and rarely allowed online long enough to have a good chat. She's growing up without me around all of a sudden, and even though she's six years younger and an incredible distance from me in some aspects of her personality, I still love her. I see in her a lot that reflects myself at that age, and because of that I worry that she'll make the same mistakes I did. I want to be around to help her grow up, be a cool older sister who she can come to when she needs her hair done for a dance or advice on that boy in her math class, or just needs a shoulder to cry on. I used to think that I'd be glad I was graduating high school the year before she entered it. Now I wish I hadn't been so quick to dismiss my little shadow as someone I didn't need to see once in a while.

The best sources of news now are mom's emails and letters and the blogs. Sibling 1 and dad both have one, and I assume that Sibling 2 may start one as well, when she gets a little older and has the time to sit down and write. I hope the two who have them already continue to update, since this is the only way I've been able to feel like I'm still connected to my family. Being so far away has suddenly become hard to deal with at times. I don't quite understand it yet. I know that if I lived at home I'd be sick of them in no time, but being removed from people who know me better than anyone else does makes me realize how much I miss having them around. That they know just how to get under my skin is an indication of how well they really do know who I am.

Another thing I wonder is whether I've really changed as much as I believe, or if they have all been changes that were waiting to happen anyway. A lot has happened in the last five months and some of it I haven't told to my family, whether it's just the course of a day and what was said or done to make me think about something new, or something that took place over the course of a week or month or longer which I simply left untold. There are some secrets, of course... things which I don't think my family would want to know, or things I don't want them to... but for the most part, I wish I could share with them the happenings of every day, because I want them to see what I've been seeing and find out what I learned. Sharing with friends here has taken the place of talking to family, to some extent, but even most of my friends here don't know me that well yet, nor do they hear half of what I think and feel. I miss my family.

Last weekend Rick came to vist, and to attend the winter semi-formal I'd invited him to weeks ago. I count him among the family too, now. It was a relief to see him, and I had a great time at the dance. Unfortunately, we didn't even get 24 hours together, since he was being driven by his grandparents and they needed to get back home (they live not far from my family). I know I shouldn't complain, that I should be grateful for every second I get with this wonderful man, but I also wish that I could have more than just two weekends a month with him. It's hard holding up a relationship when you're an hour and a half away from each other and the only contact you have is online plus the occasional phone call. He's actually on the phone with me now ^_^ and it's great to hear his voice. "You're so female" he says, referring to the joke I just missed. I miss a lot of jokes, more so when I'm tired. He says a lot of females miss them, though. Apparently guys are too insane to understand. I believe it sometimes.

It's getting near bed time for me. I really should get to bed earlier. Pulling myself out of bed at 6:15 is just not working when I don't get into bed before midnight. *sigh*

R+D says:
Had I wings, I'd fly you home

And so, good night. I'm off to dream of something that hopefully doesn't involve missing my family, homework or spiders. Sweet dreams, world.