I wish that I could say that having a long-distance relationship is easy. I wish that I could say that it just takes a little elbow grease and willpower, and that's it. But then I'd be lying.

Just to be clear, I'm not writing this so that all of you other people in a non long-distance relationship can read this and get tips and have long and successful relationships because of the ground-breaking insight and advice I provide (although that would be cool. Bring it on, Cosmo Magazine). I'm writing this so that in a few years, when I'm no longer in a long-distance relationship, and instead can comfortably say that I am just "in a relationship," I can do my annual Googling of "Victoria Kong" and this article will pop up. And then I can read and reminisce over my naivete as a 20-year old junior in college and laugh at my sad attempt to optimistically explain the absolute hell that is communication and patience in a long-distance relationship.

According to Urban Dictionary, an obvious first choice for a reliable and academic definition, a Long Distance Relationship (or LDR, as some hip blogs on the interwebs are calling them) is described as a relationship between "People who can make things work no matter how far away they are or where they are. They truely love each other to make there love last" [sic]. Also adding to this, "It takes alot of time, energy and money, but it's sometimes worth it " [sic]. Ah... yes. That's what I was looking for! Keyword from the former quote: "sometimes." As in, "sometimes worth it." Like buying that "Pound-Plus" bar of 72 percent dark chocolate from Trader Joe's and then hiding it in a secret drawer in your desk (just kidding, that's always worth it...).

At the end of this school year, I will have been in a relationship for almost four years. To be exact, June 21 will mark four years exactly, or rather, 1461 days. But who's counting? Psh, not me. And that, as small as it seems and as ironically as it seems, is an important milestone in my relationship. We all know those couples that talk about their relationship like a newborn child. But when I, or rather we, reached a point in which another month passing was no longer a milestone to go out and celebrate, I realized it wasn't because we were no longer in the "honeymoon phase," it was because it was just another month in the relationship. Yes, it was another month gone, but we both knew with certainty that there were many more to come. It was this mutual assurance that made me realize this relationship didn't have a shelf life that was on a monthly time scale. This relationship was one that was meant to exist far longer than that.

Getting to that point, however, wasn't all sunshine and blue skies (because we're from Portland, Oregon). But what did get us to that point was communication (and some other stuff, but I won't be talking about that).

An integral part of what keeps normal relationships together is time. The fact that two people can spend time together doing big things, little things, and even insignificant things together is such a huge part of a relationship. Yet unfortunately, it is the time that is the easiest to trim when enduring long-distance. So what does keep a long-distance together if there isn't time? Time becomes synonymous with communication. Communication is the one thread allowing you to remain present in each other's lives. If you strip down a long-distance relationship, all you'll have left is a string of text messages or a smattering of voice-mail messages.

Though technology allowed us to communicate even on our busiest days, it meant that if I texted and didn't get a response, it was easy to think that I was being ignored. Intentionally. And although that wasn't the case, the reason I thought that was because when the roles were flipped in a fight, I knew how tempting it was to just turn off my phone, or go offline. Sorry, leave a message.

I realized that if I followed that nasty passive-aggressive voice in my head saying, go ahead, snip that thread, delete those texts, in doing so, I'd be erasing the one thing that allowed me to remain present in his life, and his in mine.

I hate that communication is really important, but I accept it and embrace it. Without it, I know that we could have easily drifted apart and grown into strangers. Without it, I know that I'd be going to bed tonight without getting to tell him about my day. And most importantly, because I am not a morning person, I would be waking up in the morning to an alarm blasting my eardrum out, instead of his voice through the phone wishing me a good morning.

So, yes, long-distance sucks. But frankly, I know, and he knows (I hope) that in the end, when we're old and shriveled like raisins, we will look back on these four years of long-distance and we'll laugh and smile about how we made it through this true test of a relationship. We know that in the end, this will all be worth it.