Looks like I might be the first to post who left and came back. There were a variety of reasons for leaving. I belonged to a club who lost their field (due to noise complaints) and then found a new one that was 25 minutes further away. When it became more than an hour each way, it was hard to be motivated to fly regularly. I also went through a divorce, and then started dating someone new. For some reason, she became a bit more important, although she supported my hobbies. I think there was also a bit of burnout because I had been extremely active, including participating in a show team that practiced or got together for building sessions regularly and then traveled around the state performing. I was out of the hobby for quite a while, but when I discovered that my new house was about 10 minutes from a field immediately got interested again. It took 3 sessions at the field, without a buddy box, to solo again. It should have only taken one, but the engine kept deadsticking so I took it home for rework a couple times. On the third trip to the field, the person overseeing me told me to not play around in the air, just get the required things done so he could sign me off.