Rachel left today. We said goodbye in the park, under the shadow of the Castle. She had her sunglasses on against the beaming mid-day sun. She looked brave.

I cried last night, for the first time when we picked them up from Tesco in the rain, for drinking a bottle of wine and chatting and saying to ourselves : “Yup, these are definitely the people we want to live with.” For the hard year past, full of ups and downs. For ceildh-swinging and rosé drinking and braais in the park.

The hard thing about being away is only becoming more and more apparent. I wrote a depro post about when Alana and Becks left. They were the first. Then Kate and Jono, our Edinburgh people, our intellectual debate people, our tenuous link to Rhodes people, went home. Then Isje and Jack, our family for over 18 months, our companions and guides around Edinburgh and our Friday night cheese and wine people. They left last June. Mark and Amy left next, in November, after goodbye drinks at the Canny Man. Amy with her upside down smile, booze-hagging with Isje. Mark -who my sister couldn’t understand.

Then we had a whirlwind of new friends, and soon a group, and then a gang- great, fun people who made the Edinburgh experience all the more worthwhile. Skye-roadtripping people. Ceildh dancing people. Girls’ night Thursday night horror-tour poker playing people. Friday night in the park people.

I sobbed about Casey in a taxi- about the cocktails we had in Harvey Nicks, about the Ambrosia at Christmas, about mojitos at every chance we got. I said goodbye to Pania outside of Grand Cru. I said goodbye to Kate at the door of her new home in London. I said goodbye to Rachel in the park.

All this time, the people back home are moving on- as they must, as they should. But bit by bit, day by day they are putting down deep roots with new people. My roots are spread wide across the globe, they span hundreds of miles- but they are not deep. They are transcient, shifting as people come and go with the tide, an ebb and flow of people who you hold in your hand for a while and then are gone.

I would not trade the Edinburgh sun on my back, the look of Snowdonia through rain, the icy wind for any thing. But sometimes it is hard.