Driving with my father for those countless hours gave me enough time to say goodbye, but I just couldn't form the words. So instead, when we pestered each other with our normal banter, we annoyed each other with pun-filled jokes that prompted a groan instead of a laugh. My father filled the time with stories, telling me about his childhood, his father and his grandfather whom I never had the pleasure of meeting. At that time, even though I never really said goodbye or how much I would miss him, it was sort of our way of saying it without actually speaking. Yes, we would see each other again, but they were spread out, especially in the summer months when school was out, but I used to make him breakfast in the morning while we each got ready, him for work and me. for school. I used to greet him when he walked in the door with a witty comment and a hello that made him roll his eyes. I used to help him cook dinner and listen to him deliberately butcher the lyrics to my favorite songs. These things were part of my daily life and once I got to my destination, they wouldn't be anymore. We reached Texas and our hotel in the middle of the night and no one had the energy to say or do anything other than lay down and sleep. Tomorrow would be the day we saw my father's new place, tomorrow would be the day we moved him into a new house inhibited only by him. The morning was a blur: packing up what little we had unpacked, eating breakfast and getting back into the cars we were so accustomed to and heading into a new chapter of life. The apartments my father chose were nothing special, but my father said, "As long as I have a roof over my head, walls and a bed." Everything will be fine. He was a simple man and the apartment was suitable... middle of paper... we went home. It wasn't until we had been on the road for a while and I finally saw a sign that said it had Saint Louis on it and how many miles were left the situation finally hit me. Like a dam opening, tears flowed from my eyes and I cried softly. The closer we got to home, the further we got from my father. My mother and sister said nothing, feeling the same pain as my body shook and tears streamed down my face. In some ways, the pain was worse than when my father was deployed, because by then he was so far away that I couldn't even see him until he got home. Now he was close, but also far away, he was in the same country as us this time but we weren't together. I cried until I had no more tears and when we finally entered St. Louis, the image of the Arc brought not its usual feeling of happiness and home but just another pang of sadness..