Visiting my sister

I spent last Thursday and Friday night at my sister's house in Seattle. Even though she was a bit frazzled, and the house was a bit unorganized, I could tell she was happy to see me. We had good conversations, as we always do, and she was so sweet helping me get together an outfit for my meeting Friday, an all day meeting which began at 11am.  She lives in the country, pretty far away from the freeway, so she offered to  have me follow her to the freeway onramp (I had a rental car). During the 10 or 15 minute drive over to the freeway, I was not thinking about my upcoming meeting. I was thinking about how incredibly sweet my sister had been to me that morning, helping me with everything she could think to help me with, bringing me tea and oatmeal in bed and everything. And then I realized that I had not even gotten a chance to really thank her. We just rushed out of the house, her in her car and me in my rental. When this realization really hit me, we were nearing the onramp. And I was seized by a very strong urge to give my sister a huge hug and let her know not only how much I appreciated her help, but how wonderful it was to see her, that the trip would be worth it if that was all I was doing. I tried to honk and wave at her in hopes she would pull over, but she of course thought I was just doing that to say goodbye. So when turnoff came for the freeway, I passed it up and instead kept following her. Then I signaled to turn into a sidelot. I thought for sure she would stop then, and ask me if everything was OK. But instead she thought I had just made a mistake and missed my turn, and so she quickly made a u-turn to show me the way back to the freeway. By this point, I got kind of upset, because I had no idea how to convey to her that what I wanted her to do, what I needed her to do, was just pull over and let me give her a hug. I honked again and waved my arms and she probably thought I was having a nervous breakdown. By the time I did finally get her to stop, and explain that I wanted to give her a hug, and say thank you, and let her know I loved her, we were both so upset and confused that the moment got rather ruined. (It did not help that several other drivers were staring at us trying to figure out what the problem was). But then the next day, when I was heading to the airport and she was again showing me the way to the freeway, we made sure to give each other a big hug before we left the house, and we made funny faces at each other and waved the whole way from her house to the freeway. I think she had gotten the message, that seeing her was my favorite part of the trip.

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