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How to Love a Vanishing Act
The invisible connections that stretch across time and space.
It has taken me a long time to come to terms with the idea that different seasons of life involve different people.
Some friendships last for decades, weathering moves, career shifts, and the inevitable twists of life. Some of my favorite humans fall into that category. Others exist for only a short while — a handful of months, maybe a few years — before they quietly fade into the background. I’ve had seasons where the people in my life changed drastically, and others where my circle stayed mostly the same, shifting only slightly. But no matter how many times I’ve seen it happen, one thing always tugs at me: the people we love can one day be gone.
Not in the finality of death, though that is its own heartache. But in the simple, subtle, inevitable way that life carries us in different directions. One month, you’re laughing with a friend over dinner, and the next, they’ve moved across the country for a job. One weekend, you’re catching up with a person you are getting to know better, and the next, something — a falling out, a misalignment, a quiet drifting — has shifted your rhythm of friendship, and before you realize it, the closeness has slipped away.
