I’ve received some wonderful emails from loved ones back home. I’m realizing why it was relatively easy to leave. I’m blessed with truly amazing people in my life, and that is a gift that they’re not going to take back simply because I’ve gone traveling. So many other goodbyes have been shrouded with a clinging panic. But I feel that I still have the company of my friends and family, however distant any of them are from me at this moment. Sure, email makes it that much easier to stay in contact and get a “fix”, but more than that, there’s a sense of letting go that makes space for the connections to remain where clinging would otherwise leave no room. It seems that fear crowds out the experience of connection. Fear becomes self-fulfilling. So simple, but such a difficult realization to get to.