Family ties

It's been a long time I have been living on my own. It's been many years I have been living in London, away from my country, away from the little family I have left there. All my visits have been usually short and tempestuous, hardly ever benefiting from spending quality time with my closest. But these days I have been reminded about all that I have been missing all these years...

My mother and my cousin (to whom I am so close that I often and fondly refer to as my little sister) visited me for the first time since I took up the challenge of living abroad and granted me one of the most rewarding experiences of my life up to date. Because I have been unable to share the everyday realities of my existence in London with my closest and dearest, I have always felt like a huge bridge that was between us needed to be crossed in order to align the two worlds I have been living in almost simultaneously for the past 8ish years...

I have been given an amazing gift and their visit has been heart filling. From the fact that I saw my mother enjoying every moment of it to the cuddles and the jokes we've shared, from their daily discoveries of a city I adore to the night to the Opera where my mum and I went to see Tosca, I have been experiencing joy and laughter and an incredible feeling of peace. As if they have given me blessing for the life I chose to live. My life and my choices have been validated and all my efforts compensated. But above all, I suddenly stopped feeling alone. If every once in a while I get surrounded by sadness and loneliness, I now realized I am not and will never be alone. I do have a family, I indeed have been blessed and even though the road to getting where I am now hasn't always been smooth, I am truly grateful for everything I've got and profoundly happy that being a daughter is yet another thing I am unable to fail...

I thought it would be stressful but it has been accomplishing. The two of them are getting along so well and have enojoyed their London experience so much that none of my initial worries materialised. In fact, now that they are on the plane back to Romania, I can't help but cry a little, missing them already, and start making plans for when they will come again. And who knows, perhaps one day, I will have my family with me and all these lonely days will have become a thing of the past, a thing of the past I will look back upon and smile... Because everything happens for a reason and every experience is what makes a life.