Surviving a Long Distance Relationship

It's not easy all the time. Usually, after we spend an extended period of time together, it's very hard to say goodbye at the train station, knowing he'll go back to being words on a screen or a disembodied voice through my speakers. I love that we're so similar in our habits (read; both complete nerds) that 'hanging out' online is easy and natural for us, but sometimes it just plain doesn't cut it. Real Life Moose is just so much better than Online Moose.

But, y'know, someday he won't be Online Moose anymore. There's an end in sight, now he's out of university and making plans to move closer. There are a lot of big changes coming, and the next five years could be really crazy. It's still a slow process, but it's happening, and I can't wait until the dust has settled and we'll be able to look back and realise that, yes, we survived the long distance relationship.

I met Moose online, during a game of Team Fortress 2, and honestly I think the way we met has saved us from a lot of the hardships that come with long distance relationships. He and I are gamers, and our online circle of friends (and, heck, offline friends, too) are gamers as well. We met on TF2, and grew closer because we spent every single evening, often for hours at a time, on the same silly map together. Some of my favourite people right now are people I met on that map, and most of them are still a part of my daily life, years later, because we're all part of a community that connects every day to chat and 'hang out' and play games together.

And when we're not gaming together, Moose and I talk all the time. And I'm not even really exaggerating. If we're both home, we're both on Steam, typing away. In the evenings, we'll both be on TeamSpeak chatting amongst our friends, too. If one of us isn't online, we'll be texting, Whatsapping, sharing photos and calling each other. He calls me every lunch break when he's at work, and most commutes to and from, too. With all this, I probably spend more time 'with' Moose than anybody else, even though we only get to see each other face to face a couple of times a month. We're both such a huge part of each other's lives. We both love each other's friends. We both want the same things in the future, so that's the goal. Isn't it everybody's?

In light of Moose and I celebrating our fifth anniversary as a couple, I figured it might be nice to talk about long distance relationships and how on Earth they can work. Or rather, how on Earth one seems to have worked for us. I have to preface this first by saying that I'm aware our 'distance' really isn't so bad - Moose lives currently in London and I'm down in the South West, so we're at most a three hour train journey from each other. It's not much, and it's doable even for a day trip, so we're luckier than many.

Still, we are a long distance relationship. I don't get to see him after work. I don't get to watch Doctor Who with him on live television, or eat dinner with him, or warm my hands on his belly after a long walk home. He's probably quite thankful for that last part.