Heading home

The end of July meant it was also the end of my work contract. I had to go back home. I missed my kids and wanted to see them, but Santiago was beginning to feel like home and being with Claudia was like a dream come true.

When we were at the airport, we said, "we're not saying goodbye, we're saying see you later." I was sad to leave the love of my life but felt such a connection that I wanted to try to keep it going. We both did. 

10,304kms. Tamarindo, Costa Rica is the halfway point between us. 

I really wasn't sure if a long distance relationship could work (especially such a long, long, long distance), but we were both willing to give it our best shot. I thought about Claudia all the way home to Calgary.

What we discovered in the first month was that Whatsapp is a very good communication tool. We could text, talk and video call each other. This helped. Without physical contact, our relationship grew deeper and we spent hours on the phone talking about many, many things. We got to know each other well. I missed our walks and sharing a pisco sour but our love grew deeper and deeper with each passing day. 

I researched many activities we could do together - technology helps long distance relationships in so many ways. We watch movies together, we cook together and read poetry to one another - we have a shared playlist on Spotify and can be connected at any time. 

We took August and September working out how we could arrange to see each other from time to time. It was settled, I would go back in October.