Despite frequent phone calls, e-mails and chats on AOL Instant Messenger, the absence is often hard to take.

"It's very difficult knowing that you care about someone so much but know that you can't see him all the time," says Kelly E. Morrell '02, whose boyfriend attends the University of Pennsylvania.

Morrell tries to tie her two worlds together by talking to Harvard friends who know her boyfriend. By telling stories about him, he stays "real" in her mind, she says.

"When someone isn't around all the time, there can be a problem of attaching an ideal to what they really are," Morrell added.

Still, the distance allows Morrell greater personal freedom.

"It gives me a chance to carve out a collegiate life for myself without him here," she says.

Matthew D. Bucknor '03, whose girlfriend attends Brown University in Providence, R.I., says long-distance relationships are a chance to have it all.

Despite retaining an intense connection to his girlfriend at Brown, Bucknor still feels active in the Harvard social scene.