NO (WO)MAN IS AN ISLAND

This is a rant.  A pure, unadulterated rant.  If you're up to reading a rant, keep going, please.  If not, better you just leave now.

I'm lonely.  There, I said it.  

Almost 2 1/2 years into my assignment, there are just certain things that are not resolving themselves, and companionship is one of them.  I am not hearing anything. ever. from any of my friends back home. ever.  You want to know why I started this blog?  Supposedly so THEY could keep up with ME.  So it surprises me that none of them even follow me. Out of my own family I have ONE person who follows this blog.  I hear more from other need greaters I've met here and random people throughout the world who read this blog than I do from ANY of my friends from home.  Then when I go home, they're all like, let's keep in touch.  You want to know how many people I've given this blog address to who've never read it?  I've actually saved it in their iPhones and they still don't read it?  I've sent an invite to their email and they don't accept it?

My Mom says, "People are just busy."  You want to know what I say?  The same thing I say to my students...we make time for the things we WANT to make time for.  You are living in a country where you have:
1. a smartphone with constant 3G and WiFi connections
2. a laptop
3. a tablet
4. a home office
5. a work office
and yet you never talk to me.  Maybe you're not talking to anyone?  Yep, that's what I thought too until I continually embarrass myself saying that to people just for them to respond, "Weird, because she's on Facebook/Instagram/etc all the time."  Hmmm.  So apparently, you've just decided that because I don't work on the same platform YOU do i.e. Skype, email, Pinterest it's just IMPOSSIBLE for us to keep in touch.

You know what I think it is?  I think it's a subtle way of just saying "we're done."  And it hurts.  It hurts that people who I thought would be in my corner FOREVER have decided that because we no longer live close to each other, it's over.  And it especially hurts because it's not the easiest thing to make good friends.  Especially when you're a need greater/missionary.  Are we all family/brothers?  Yes.  Does that mean we're all intimate and you can emotionally rely on everyone?  No.  Especially when you're trying to make lasting friendships through a language barrier, a cultural barrier, and the fact that everyone knows you may not be here for long so why put the effort into drawing close to you.

So those of you who DO read my blog and always email about your dreams to be a need greater, keep this post in mind.  If you're thinking that you'll have the support of friends back home when you move, you may want to double think that.  Maybe you have better friends than I do.  Or maybe you also will find that it's just you and Jehovah.

Am I seriously the only one with this problem?