In the beginning...

Me: San Francisco, USA

Him: Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Distance: 10,000 miles

When I was 25, had a Life Plan, and considered myself to be a Serious Adult, I met the love of my life. This was not something I realised at our first meeting, (and definitely not something he realised, given he cannot remember said meeting). He was undeniably attractive but also unbelievably arrogant and irritating, as I repeatedly confided to my then flatmate. These early impressions caused much hilarity three years later when I asked her to be a bridesmaid. (It is worth noting that I was definitely right about undeniably attractive, definitely wrong about unbelievably arrogant, and some days still sit on the fence about the irritating).

Although both from the UK, most of our lives together have been spent in East Africa. We are now based in Kenya full time, where we are fortunate enough to both be doing work we love for organisations we are passionate about. In many ways, we are living the dream. Married to our best friend, seeing so much of the world and being inspired by its people, and working in jobs we believe can make a difference. But that a) wouldn't make for interesting reading and b) wouldn't make for real life.

In real life, we spend much of our time on the road and far too much of our relationship is over dodgy Skype connections and intermittent WhatsApp. Flying so often sounds glamorous until you realise you spend more time in the airport coffee lounge than your own lounge. And it is not just each other we struggle to keep up with, but also our families (many ex-pats move overseas to avoid their families but, inconveniently, we actually like ours) and increasingly international friends (who, also inconveniently, keep moving countries and continents).

This, I believe, calls in a new era of relationships. If Jane Austen were writing today, I like to think she would base a novel around Distance and Proximity. The concept that one minute you are responsible for figuring out how to navigate through the shady part of town alone, and the next you are two time zones over and expected to remember to offer to make the other person a cup of tea if you put the kettle on.

The travel has been particularly intense for the past six months. Today I called him this morning from my hotel room in San Francisco, where we shouted over the music from the pub he was at in Tanzania. I keep trying to tell myself and anyone else who will listen that this is just a phase and it will get better, but I'm not sure I'm that convincing. So I've decided to try to live more in the moment and see it for the positives it brings, or at least work to make sure we try to bring some positives. This new blog is an effort to do just that. Although, in fair warning to the reader, it may turn into a bit of a therapeutic whinge-fest at times.