My little bird flies the coop

Today my littlest bird flies the coop. About as far as a person can go. Amy and Todd leave today for Cambodia. They will be in LA for a couple of days and will actually be in the Seoul, South Korea airport the SAME day as Riley but they won't see each other. He is coming back from Mongolia and has a five-hour layover there but they don't get there until after he leaves. He won't see her for four months.

This will be the first time Amy and I have been away from each other longer than three weeks. It's only three months. It's only three months. But still, that's a long time when I've come to depend on Amy for laughs, giggles, crazy faces, a strange doll hiding in my sock drawer, meows, texts, shoulder gnaws, dinners out, talking on the lawn at grandma's with the neighbor's dogs licking her toes and about a thousand other things. She's taking her Wonder Woman attitude (not the underwear, I think it's in a box somewhere) from 3-year-old Amy to the other side of the world.

When Jason left on his mission, I had a hard time emotionally. I knew he was doing what he needed to do, but Taiwan was an awful long way for him to go. I kept an unwashed shirt of his in a zip-loc bag so I could smell "him" when I was missing him a lot. It helped. (I don't care if anyone thinks that's crazy, it helped.) When you have a missionary out you are strengthened by Heavenly Father so the "missing" isn't so bad. It was the same with Andrea who left for 18 months on her mission. I missed her terribly. I didn't know how I would live without her smile, her fun guitar songs, her lively personality. But I did. Two of the best days in my life were reuniting with Jason in the mission home in Taiwan and running down the long driveway at the mission home in Argentina to experience a group hug with Andrea and Amy as Riley took pictures. Back with my kids again. The gap was closed.

Now the gap opens. Todd is shooting a documentary about orphans. They will live in the orphanage with the kids. They will meet the king of Cambodia. They might meet Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie - also part of the documentary. They will eat Cambodian food. Amy will teach art and English to little people. What an adventure!

And they will be able to video chat, I hope. Something we couldn't do with Jason or Andrea. I video chat with Riley in Mongolia and it helps but I still know there's a half a world between us. And yet, I want her to go. This is the first great adventure of their lifetime. I'm sure there will be many, seeing as how Todd is going to be a famous international film director. I want her to love the people there, to endear herself with the kids, to teach them as they teach her. I want her to savor the foods, the sights, the sounds and the way of life. One thing I've learned about travel is there is a big, wonderful world beyond Provo, Utah. Like Austin, Texas and San Francisco and Maupiti. And all these places make up the experiences of our life and introduced new beloved friends to our lives. So it will happen for Todd and Amy. They will be a part of Cambodia. It's only three months.