Long-distance relationships are not easy.. I don’t think it would be possible without cellphones and pagers. A quick “RU UP?’ lets us chat at 3a. I think everyone can agree on that. It’s even more challenging when one person works night shift and the other works 24-hour shifts. The best thing about our schedules is that it allows for some chunks of time off that we can spend together. Also 3am is not the time for overthinking; for us, it’s when people [babies on my end; adults on his] have finally gone to sleep.
Hospitals are a weird place anyway. In some ways, time stops. We’re still living in the 1990s with our reliance on pagers and cellphones. Technology and 3am calls keep us together, but I miss the days when we worked together and Chris would hang out in my office and we could talk about random things in person. What I wouldn’t give to be able to see him as I hear him. Its so strange to have seen him this very morning at the bookstore and yet know it will be 2-3 weeks before we see each other again.
I wonder if it will always be this way. In order for me to do pursue my passion, I have to give up on another port of my life. It was a thorn in the relationship with Justin as well. Everything was great in the beginning until we started about the future. While I could do my job in major city with a teaching hospital, I can’t move every year. And while Justin was a NHL player, players can be traded in season and out. And after his playing career, all he talked about was going back home to Canada. And while not completely opposed to immigrating to Canada, I’d have to give up my future. And Justin always talked about kids. He said he would love to have three, but understood if that didn’t happen, Just like every other relationship, that left me out in the cold. Better to have ended it sooner rather than later, I guess.
Chris and I grew up literally 5 minutes apart. Neither of us wanted to every go back We worked together for 3 years before he said he liked me. Why couldn’t he have said this before I moved away. Now our lives revolve around cellphones and pagers and the odd hospital schedules
