Goodbyes, Memories, And Tears

I can't count the number of times that I have gone to bed to find myself crying for something that I almost never had before. I want so much to fall asleep in his arms. Just to know that he is there beside me ya know? I am still young and I never did that with my boyfriend before I went back to my home. But I always hugged him and loved the feel of his arms around me. I now go to sleep and cry over the memory of having his arms around me because now it is only just a memory.

I remember our goodbye, that last time like many other women. Unlike most I was calm and cool through the whole thing. He was the one to admit that he broke down when he left because he knew I was going home in a few days. I also knew that I was going home, but it was a faint idea to me still. Something that I wouldn't really feel. When I left my home country I felt no real attachment to it other than it was the place where things in my view were normal. It may have been what I thought would happen with this country that I was leaving after my year of Exchange. The country that I had come to both love and hate for the year that had passed. I was wrong in thinking that it wouldn't be any different for me to go home as it was when I arrived.

The family that I had been with had taken my cell phone a few months before, and I hardly blame them. I remembered a recording that I had made with my boyfriend long before we were even thinking about me going back. I had just found out that my cell phone could make recordings and I shouted at him "speak!" He looked at my cell and then at me and said "speak?" I knew he was asking me really as to what to say to a cell phone. I was full of energy at the time like I always was when I was with my friends and the people I loved so I didn't really care what he said so long as it was something and it was him saying it. So in a shaky voice I said to him once again "speak" He took my hand that was holding the cell and said into it "I love you." It may have been something that I had heard from him already but it still surprised me that he would put that much of himself on the line for someone that wasn't going to stay. Afterwards he demanded I say it too and when I did he once again told me/my cell that he loved me.

It was this recording that I listened to before my first plane back home. It brought back the whole memory of that time and some of that day that I could actually remember that I couldn't stop the tears. It had finally hit me that I was going home. I was going to leave and see him in either two years or more, or never see him and my friends again. It really hit me then and I was crying in the middle of the gate for everyone who was boarding to see. One woman got up the courage to ask me what was wrong. It was easy to like her when she asked me seeing I was a minor and that I was sad, but I half laughed when she asked me if I was crying because I was lost. When I explained to her that I was crying over a recording no other explanation was needed for her to understand.

I can't say I hate exchange. I know some who say it in anger when seeing someone they came to love walk through the gate to never be seen again. Or simply because the year is over and they think that it will be the last time they see the incredible people they met again. I can understand why they would say that. It is easy for me to say I hate exchange because I met people and I may never see them again. The most incredible people I have met so far and all I want is to not have it end. I want to see them again. I want to go back.

I am starting a long distance relationship. I consider myself a daydreamer but I would like some friends to help me through.

Thanks for reading.