I’m Back!

Project 365, Day 230/365

FOAS! I have returned. Well, technically, I returned a few days ago, but transitioning back to life after two weeks away is always much more of a shock to the system than I ever give it credit for being. I always think I need a day or so, and then boom, I’m back. Ha, no. Time is a funny thing, in that I feel as if I’ve been gone for what in my mind presents as literal months. Putting fingers to keyboard feels almost foreign; stretching my brain to talk-write is like going back to school after a long summer off. Do I remember how to read? Do I remember any of the math I learned the year before?

Honestly, it if wasn’t for your AMAZING effort and presence here over the past three weeks, it might seem even weirder. Like starting middle school…in a different city…with all new friends. Instead, it feels like I’m coming back to my group of buds, exciting to see what everyone is wearing, what everyone did over the summer. Admittedly, I haven’t caught up on all of the comments yet, and there’s a part of me that wants to leave it be. Not out of laziness, but out of a sense that…this was your world while I was away, and poking around in it to catch up is like the teacher coming back and sitting down with everyone at lunch, asking “What’s the haps?” We’ll see.

To riff off the “back to school/blogging” theme I’ve clearly been running with here, I’ll briefly let everyone know what I did during my time away.

Honestly…not a lot. HA. If you’re a human being with ears and eyes, you likely know Florida is a HOT MESS of a COVID disaster, so even though myself, Charles, all my family and all my friends are vaccinated, the Delta variant is something I didn’t take lightly. We spent half our time up in Orlando—which is both of our hometowns…it’s where Charles and I met…in high school!—and the rest of the time in South Florida, where we lived before moving to LA.

We mostly sat around, talked, laughed, cuddled on the couch, ate, slept, slept some more, and everything you do when you haven’t seen the people that mean the most to you in the whole world in nearly two years. When you’re away from it, strangely it doesn’t feel that long of a time. The days, weeks and months pass quickly in retrospect (of course, they are agonizingly slow when you’re living it, in the moment), but when you tap back into the love and support and family and friendship, you can’t possibly imagine how you’ll go without it again when it’s time to leave.

In all honesty, it’s been hard to be back. In the words of Charles from the other day “LA has lost its luster.” He’s not wrong. And while I recognize that this kind of thing always happens after a much-needed vacation, this time feels different. I’m not mourning the loss of free time and no 7 am alarms, but rather a feeling of warmth you can only get from the people that are your world. We’ll be okay, we’ll adjust again, get back into our routines, but yeah…I miss home.

I enjoyed all of my old comforts: Publix chicken tender subs (if you know, you know; if you don’t, well…you don’t know what you’re missing), crappy not-in-the-least-bit-Mexican tacos from Tijuana Flats, chain food I haven’t eaten in three years (::cough Olive Garden baked ziti cough::)…ahh yes…the glory of suburban Florida.

It wasn’t all mostly crappy food. During my time with my parents, my mom did what she does best: forced food down my throat she made as if I came home starving, underfed for years. My absolute favorite meal as a kid—arroz con salchicas and maduros (rice with Vienna sausages and sweet plantains)—was what greeted me for dinner after long travels. It’s a bowl of comfort I haven’t enjoyed in maybe five…10?? years, and I enjoyed every bite of it.

We watched TV with my parents every night until at least half of us were snoring on the sofa, spent the evening rocking outside on Charles’ parents’ pool deck as I chatted for hours with his mom about life, saw my nephews play baseball, played several rounds of Mario Party with said nephews, SO MANY CUDDLES WITH NEPHEWS, watched my sister cry upon our arrival and departure. My best friend who lives in Atlanta even came to surprise me as I hadn’t seen her in (what we quickly realized was) four years.

At one point, driving somewhere or back from somewhere in our rental car, I turned to Charles and said, as my words caught in my throat “I think I forgot what this kind of love feels like. How much of it we both have.” Things I perhaps took very much for granted when I had it freely at my disposal. I’m grateful, SO grateful, that I got the reminder, and that time.

So, here I am. Back in my LA dining room, ready to hang with my blog buddies again. Thank you for everyone who hung around in my absence, and welcome back anyone who enjoyed their own little break from the Arlyn Says world. I’ve missed you all.

See you tomorrow, friends.