A piece I wrote when travelling solo through Argentina in summer 2022. It will bring a bit of cheesiness to your day 😉.
My heart regularly stings. Because I miss my family, and I miss my friends.
Travelling solo is hard. It’s wonderful, but it is hard, and I guess my heart “stings” for the comfort of my family, the comfort of my best friends chatting over tea about everything and anything.
Its peculiar for me. I was in China 3 years, unable to see my family, and I numbed myself to missing them. I learnt to numb – it just made things easier. Plus, I had a support system of the “bestest” of friends that I could count on whenever through whatever – that helped. Overall, though, I did not really miss my loved ones thaaaaaaaat much.
When travelling, I guess you realize just how important those people are. Because although I appreciate my time alone, meeting new people, etc.; everything is a little bit better when the people you love the most are around. They brighten your world. Yep – they do!
Its in the moments where you don’t have them, that you realize how important they are.
So then what to do? Because often, they are not available like you are, to do the trip that you want to do, or the activity you dream of. Somebody once told me that “you have to separate friends and travel” – they are two different things. Although I do not completely agree, you have to consider your priorities. For me, at this time, it’s travelling, and discovering – myself and other countries.
When you are so out of your comfort zone and away from all you know, you truly discover bits of yourself that you didn’t know before. All the most vulnerable, most difficult aspects of your personality tend to come to the surface to say hello. Beautiful and disconcerting.
One of those vulnerable aspects that has come to the surface, is just how much I love and want to be with my family, my loved ones. I have spent so long away from them – yet when I have a routine and all, it’s easy to just plod along. Left without it, its harder to ignore. I thought I would spend months traveling, I thought I would find somewhere abroad. But – now more than ever—I am ready to be close to family.
Closest friends are family too: the family you choose. Lucky and unfortunate for me then, my family is scattered all over the planet, which always means I miss somebody. But, when I see them, four years later, it is so wonderful.
Do we need our hearts to sting, in order to appreciate our family right?