Andy’s Back (and so am I)

Oh well hey ya’ll.
I’m sitting here trying to write a blog about how my boyfriend is home, but it all seems very overwhelming.

I type a couple words, and then stop, and think maybe the blog should go in one direction, or another. But ya, he’s home.

I feel overwhelmed because there has been such a huge build up to this.
I opened my ‘Long Distance Life‘ page on my blog this morning, and started to read through everything. And I started to think to myself; how can I possibly articulate, in my one blog, the final ending to a 4 year journey of being separated? And the veritaserum of it all, is that I can’t.
All I can do is write, and hopefully articulate best I can, how my long distance relationship ended.

Andy arrived home after a 10 day road trip from Florida, on June 6th 2019.
Andy left for Florida on July 25th, 2016.

That’s is:
1412 days
33,888 hours
2,033,280 minutes

I really started to get excited at the beginning of the week. I bought big gold ‘WELCOME HOME’ balloons, I ordered a large pizza from his favourite restaurant, and I started to picture all these different scenarios in my head of how we would greet each other, like a music video in my mind.

But the reality was very different.

I set up the balloons early in the morning, and then hadn’t planned anything for the rest of the day. So I paced around, did a lot of cleaning, finished the laundry, and then sat on my bed to watch some Netflix. To calm down my nerves.

I was watching ‘The Staircase’ Documentary. It was a STUNNING day, I remember I had my window opened. And then, around 5:30pm, I heard ‘HONEY I’M HOME‘.

Completely unprepared, I screamed ‘OH MY GOD’ and jumped from my bed. I heard him giggling at the front door and as I was running down the stairs, I tried to pull out my phone and press record. But when I saw him I lost all focus of everything else. I saw him at the front door, teary eyed, with a big smile on his face and I ran as fast I could, jumped into the air, landed right into his chest.

I thought we’d both start screaming because of how happy we were, but it was the complete opposite. We both balled.

Not a silent, trembling cry. Big ones. Big, heavy breath-filled sobs. Both of us. Something I had never seen from Andy before. I could hear my Dad slowly tip toe back into the other room so we could be alone, and when I pulled away Andy’s puffy face was RIGHT THERE, IN FRONT OF ME, NOT GOING ANYWHERE.

After we ate our pizza, we sat in the backyard. Both exhausted from emotion. 4 years. At that point I grabbed my phone to see what it had recorded, in my hand, in that moment. Nothing. It recorded nothing. I hadn’t even pressed the button. I locked my phone and smiled.

Unbothered, just happy. I was entirely, 100 percent in the moment when it happened, and although I have spent so many years sharing our journey with you guys…that moment was for us.

Just us.

…

Thank you for coming along this journey with us.
It really means a lot.
A special thanks to Andy for letting me share personal details about our lives over the years, and of course for sticking with me through the distance (duh).

The funniest part about all of this, is a week later Andy had to leave again for BC. Just for a week. He left last night. I gave him a kiss goodbye and told him I’d see him soon. I walked into my house, no tears, no lump in my stomach. And that’s when it kind of hit me.

That four years was so unbelievably worth it. Because if we can do that, we can do anything.

and maybe now with my new found inspiration, I’ll start filling this space of the internet with a bit more contact. How does that sound?

Sending love and light where ever you are,
Sarah.