I’ve lived in the same place for over two years now.
In this amount of time, my family has never come down to visit. I understand that they’re extremely busy people, but I think it’s a bit ridiculous that they can’t find time to come see my place of work, my home, or my new city. Most of all, it stings that my mother won’t find time to make the trip. I wish that she had an interest in my life as an adult’s, rather than trying to treat me like a kid for the rest of my life. Unfortunately, she is unlikely to ever change her ways or hit the road to visit. In fact, when it comes to traveling, she has more anxieties than you could believe. Not only is she worried about the actual travel component, but she goes so far as to preemptively complain about the imagined indoor air quality equipment on said vehicle. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard her talk about the terrible air quality on airplanes and the prevalence of nasty, airborne germs. The thing is, she hasn’t been on an airplane to experience the stagnant recycled air in over two decades. When I recommended that she rents a car instead of relying on the communal airplane, she starts immediately hypothesizing that the on-board heating and cooling system will probably not work well. She starts talking about the streaming sunlight heating up her vehicle, and how the on-board cooling system will only irritate her lungs rather than cooling down the hub of the car. She really loves to catastrophize the entire traveling experience. Don’t worry, she leaves no stone unturned. She also likes to tell me about how uncomfortable she assumes my home’s central heating and cooling system will be.
