Tuesday, March 31, 2009

Long Distance Relationships Stink.

My story isn't new. It's so old, it will drive you from my blog looking for fresher posts. I just have to write about it. Why? Because it's bothering me, and this is my outlet, my place to work things out, my escape. So here goes.

I live on the west coast. 95% of my guild lives in the middle of the country and on the east coast. So, it makes sense that raid times and events are centered around them and not me. Raids fall right when I am frantically plating up dinner for the kids and hubby. If I decide to raid with them, I have to serve dinner by 4:45, so that I have 5 minutes to repair and send myself consumables and purge my bags of the garbage I've collected the day before. This doesn't work, and I have demonstrated how well this doesn't work on a few occasions to my guild, by showing up late, with a fish as an offhand and a fishing hat on, and not changing either out for the entire raid. So, because it isn't fair for them to expect me to be on time and prepared when I clearly can't, I don't sign up for raids. Now, it's also not fair to my family to get a half fast attempt at dinner out of me, just to watch me drag my plate to my desk so I can grab bites between boss fights. So, I have also started logging in later at night, closer to my eight in the evening then theirs. This has me logging in when they are well into their raid, sometimes after they have even finished. There are sometimes other people online for me to chit chat with, but more often, it's the raid group, me, and a few off in their own PvP world. When guild chat is quiet, I often type a "shhh" to try and get some response, but even that has lately been ignored. It's not their fault. It's not my fault either. We just live in different time zones. But I have been feeling less and less a part of my guild that I have been in since before hubby and I were married and playing Star Wars Galaxies. I even thought, for about a nanosecond, about finding another server with people that lived closer to me. Then I shook myself, slapped myself for thinking such horrible thoughts, and went on with whatever inanity I was doing in game that day.

So, it's almost April Fools Day, and my joke is set to be sprung on my somewhat oblivious audience. I know it will be seen. I look forward to the mayhem it should cause. For a while I will feel useful and like I'm a part of things. Then, April 3rd will show itself, and the site will go back to somewhat normality, and I will slowly get back into my funk. I just wish I had some idea of what to do about it.

There's a chocolate muffin calling to me from the kitchen. It's telling me I need to take it and a glass of milk and log in Rowena and check my auctions. I may just do some of that. Rowena will be disappointed. I think I'll just grab a book instead. Any good ones out there on long distance relationships?

3 comments:

Billy Wallace said...

I feel your pain. I am pretty casual due to scheduling conflicts more than anything. I just got invited to a 25 man Nax for Sat. Great!...then they tell me they start at 12 noon server time, which is 9 am my time. That doesn't fly with a wife and 5 kids around.

Even my non-raiding casual friends are mostly east coast or even Okinawa. Some nights I wait til he logs on to say hi, then I log off to get a few hours before I gotta get up and be a dad again.

Anonymous said...

My situation is slightly different as far as positioning goes as I'm on the east coast and my guild is on the west coast and late raids are probably a lot less inconvenient than really early raids.

Still kind of sucks that raids don't begin until around 10PM for me. That's what time invites go out but summons need to be done and occasional we need to fill some spots with pugs and so forth. >.> So the raid actually starts a little later than that and I'm already half asleep.

Love my guild though, so it's worth it.

ShawndraKai said...

Naissa, that is totally where I am at. I love my guild. Wouldn't leave them for the world. But, a vacation is nice :)

Billy, all I can say is ugh. I cannot raid until evenings for just the same reason...too many kids running around! I am slacking this week posting because half the house is sick. Gotta be the mom first!