Hitting the wall

It happens eventually. You can go only so long commenting about the relative trivialities of living in a new place before the new and interesting becomes the day-to-day, and suddenly there's not much left to talk (or, in this case, write) about. It's a big reason that these posts have trailed of in the past few weeks.

And it's started to creep into the phone conversations we have with our families:
"What's going on there?"
"Not a damn thing -- same old same old. What about you -- what's new there?"
"Nothing really . . ."

Just today, I had complete conversations with Carl and Arline that went pretty much according to this script. Then just before I hung up, Arline got on the phone and said, "Oh, tell Kim that I've stopped smoking." (Three weeks so far, she says, so way to go Arline.)

I told Kim that this would happen at some point -- eventually, the major topic of conversation on the phone will be the weather. Then, at Christmas, we'll come home and hear something like, "Well, remember a few months ago when your father fell out the window . . . ?" and we'll say, "WHOA! You never told me that!" Meanwhile, the little relatives will have grown into young adults, talking and dressing in ways we couldn't have imagined, and we'll be astonished at all that we've missed just being away from the day-to-day.

Unfortunately, it's unavoidable. And it just may be the toughest part of being away from home.

By the way, it's raining here. How is it there?