People sometimes ask me if I miss Long Island - no. Not one bit - don't get me wrong, I love the beach and kitschy stores but I can get that pretty much anywhere(for about a third of the price to boot). I have only been back there a few times since I moved away and every time I go back - it's like going through a year book. I remember where the roller rink was, where we ice skated all winter at Sears Bellows ponds, clutching a cup of hot cocoa in front of a roaring bonfire waiting for one of our moms to come pick us up. It's gone - all of it. No more ice skating, no more roller skates. Setsu and Mikio are gone of course, for years, their house is sold - all of our neighbors are gone too.
When I was home a few years ago aside from my parents, my cousin and her family and a few old friends - everyone is gone. The neighborhood my children grew up in is unrecognizable and I know very few people. We are everywhere - my best friends are in Vermont, Oregon and Florida. My cousins? Virginia, Long Island, Nebraska - brother is in Georgia and my sister is at the far end of Pennsylvania. One son is currently in Kentucky but is moving to Louisiana and my son with his family are settled in Washington. My Uncle and aunt are in Colorado - it's like someone just put us all in a box, shook it and flung us out into space to land where ever we could. And it makes it so hard! I said to David the other day I would love to take a real vacation, one where we weren't running like crazy people to visit everyone. Because that's where it gets nuts - that is all of our trips. David went to LI last year to see his family, I went to see my sister. We drove to see Adam and Jackson. I flew to go to Brandi's baby shower and just came back from a week of helping them drive cross country. I tired to work in my cousin Thomas's - we were an hour from his house at one point, but I just couldn't make it work.
Sometimes we talk about moving again, after all there is nothing aside from my job holding us here. I would like to live near someone I either know well or am related to - but that even gets hard -because my entire family is just as mobile as I am. There is nothing guarenteeing when we arrive at our destination that we will not be alone again. My kids pop around just as much as we do and so do our friends. We are still connected, I know who's graduating and who's shipping out - and who's shipping in. Who got a boy scout badge and what college was chosen. I have said many times thank goodness for Facebook as my entire family is on there so we can see pictures and know what's going with each other at least. I know part of this has been brought on by becoming a grandmother - it's hard to know I have two beautiful granddaughters growing up without us on the opposite side of country. I love where we live with the acres of open land around us and I do like my job (most days, other days not so much). But I get tired sometimes, of missing everyone.
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