Another Day, Another Sadness

Here we are, another week has gone by since my last typing. I realized I didn’t upload my last one after writing it, just saved it. It’s Saturday night here and I’m lonely yet again. The number of days that I feel tears at the thought of being away is becoming more than the days that I don’t. Watching all of these happy families in Korea, seeing the kids smiling, it makes me miss everyone all the more.

I was trying to draw my mind away from missing home and I lost it. I broke down in tears at the weirdest of things… a youtube video of an orchestra doing a surprise performance at a mall. It wasn’t a modern song, or sad one, it was just a very moving one. I completely broke down. I couldn’t control myself. Tears started running down my cheeks, I couldn’t see anything, I could only hear the music. I don’t know that I’ve ever had that happen.

I couldn’t tell you why it happened, or what caused it, or why it moved me in the way that it did. Maybe it was imagining the piano in the living room getting used. Maybe it was the thought of getting Char playing it in the future, or Mom learning the song she always wanted to learn on it, or even Syd just banging away at the keys once we eventually find the cord for it. The idea of Char learning an instrument that she loves and playing it all hours of the day. Even typing this it makes me sad in the best of ways.

I’m sad for all the things I’m missing. Every time I get on video chat and Syd steals the phone from Mom, or the way in which she reacts now compared to even when I left. The way she just holds the phone while doing nothing at all, just to hold the phone, almost as if she misses me and wants to keep me close when she can, it makes me sad as can be. But alas, I have to get off the phone so I can sleep, or so she can sleep, or so I can just be sad without them seeing it in my eyes or hearing the crack in my voice. And just knowing that I’m missing all of that, and I’m going to miss more when Char is home.

I’m also sad knowing that Syd will be out of her mind with joy when she sees her sister, and knowing that she’s going to be out of her mind with sadness herself when she has to leave again. But I don’t know what else we can do about that right now. It’s what has to be done, and we can’t change that. There’s so much I want to say and so much I want to do, but I can’t. I can be sad though, and I can hope for the day that Char stands up for herself and makes a point to say what it is that she wants, damned with the consequence. Heck, she does it with us all the time. I’m happy to be raising her to be a strong willed, self sufficient young woman, even if it means she stands up to us.

The world is a rough place and I want them to be prepared. I’m sad for all the things I miss, but hopefully they’ll understand that it is a rough place, and this is what I have to do for our family.

Love, Papa