Wanting more than a phone

I was talking to a friend from Illinois the other day who moved out here not long ago for a job. I asked him about his family and I found out that besides having Midwest roots in common, we also both dealt with moving in the same way. "You're going to think I'm crazy," he said. "For a long time after I came out here, I hated talking to my family. I wouldn't pick up the phone." He hated talking to them because he loves them, and misses them, and a ten-minute phone conversation just isn't enough. I felt, and still sometimes feel, exactly the same. It's painful. Because as much as you love to hear their voices, all you really want is to be sitting in the same room as them. And no matter how hard you try not to, they'll tell certain jokes that make you cry instead of laugh.