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GentileDomNY -> RE: Long distance relationships (11/22/2005 8:59:02 AM)
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LDR can be great, but they are a totally different thing than local relationships, more like a very special form of friendships that will never be anything other than that. Because of career mobility, I've developed a lot of experience with that, They can be excellent special friendships, very special, but never anything close to filling a day to day need.
Let me offer 2 specific examples.
One is someone I worked with about 28 years ago, and we had an evolving casual relationship over about 2 years. A corporate change sent us in different directions with about 6 months notice, and the stress of that 6 months brought us closer. She was engaged to someone else, and shortly after we both moved both the guy she was engaged to and her grandmother whom she was close to died, and she came to me for support. We are about 14-16 hrs drive apart. We'd correspond or have a long phone conversation a few times a year (pre-email), and see each other occasionally, sometimes 2-3 times a year and sometimes once every 2 years, and usually it would just be talking over a long lunch in a quiet place, but occasionally it would be a few days. When she was about to get married, she came to visit me. When her father died, I went to see her. When she was trying to decide on a career change, she came to visit me. When Her mother died, she came to visit me, When she learned she had cancer, I went to see her. When her husband died, she came to visit me. We are very special friends. That kind of LTR can work.
The other extreme is someone who is constantly needy. She was a nurse who worked 3p-11p regularly, but usually got home closer to 1. I worked a routine 9-5. We lived about 30 minutes apart, the opposite direction from my work. Whenever she had a particularly stressful or disturbing shift, she wanted someone to come over. She'd call at 1, it would be 6-7 before you'd leave, and a push to get to work. This would be 2-3 times a week in addition to anything that was normal or planned. It was just too much, and could only be resolved by her getting a different job. If a different job wasn't an option, then it would simply be an impossible situation.
I've had the experience of someone who was litterally next door, and that can be more of a strain then a substantial distance.
Some of my best experiences have been with people who were 2-3 hours away, which was possibly a function of my unique geography. Write now all of my long-term friends are at very substantial distances, and I've simply accepted that that it pretty much the end of everything beyond a form of special friendship. I would't write off someone because they aren't just down the street, but understand that with distance comes a fundamentally different dynamic to the relationship, which may or may not be satisfying to you..
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