Some things don't change

I keep on discovering that there are things in life that don't change, regardless of the continent you live in, if you have the ocean around you, which ocean surrounds you, etc.

Above all things, personal limits or limitations.
Some limitations can be overcome with purposeful determination: learning a new language, learning a technical skill or creative skill (depending on which is oposite of your natural inclination). There are others that seem impossible yet are achievable: increase intelligence, understand women, increase pain tolerance.
All though none of these are essential to existence, they all have a purpose or benefit.
There is something they have in common, which is they require often repetition in order to be acquired.

Where am i going with this?

There are other skills that are impossible to change.
the ability not to miss someone, something, some place.
It doesn't meet the two requirements listed above:
- it is not repeatable because we don't control feelings with our will
- it has no benefit (except for reducing emotional pain)

Other external factors usually influence our emotion and make it seem as if the "skill" level had changed. But in reality what has changed are other things.

I have discovered my level of "separation tolerance" almost five years ago and it's still the same. Two years.

I don't have the privilege of having my immediate family around me. As a matter of fact, we become more and more dispersed and it becomes harder and harder to stay in touch and to see each other.
On a couple of occasions we have been able to travel home a two years in a row, but it is a rare exception, two years is more common. By many standards that's already very often. My brother has been home only once since he moved to the US 6 years ago and I don't think he is planning on going much more often than he has.
My wife would visit her family in PR at least once a year and I could tell after only 6 months that she would start missing them.
For me, the first year of separation is easily tolerable, the second is always harder.
Phone calls would become more frequent and longer, mellow days would become more frequent, cooking typical dishes would become more frequent, etc.
DAMN IT'S HARD!!!!!
It's been two years now and i have no hope of going back for another 18 months. It's hard, very hard.
Last Sunday I was talking on the phone with my parents and I couldn't help but to choke up. I miss them immensely.
I miss the food, the noise, the smells, people's stubbornness, talking to my parents, laughing with my brother, being able to hug my dear cousin Noemi, taking walks with friends, gelato, the beach and thousand of other little things.
All i want is to be able to be there.

Argh! Life! It takes you places you want to be, but doesn't allow you to take all the people you care for with you. What a deep revelation.

Who knows maybe I will miss Virginia this much too in a couple of years?

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