Dear Ismael,
If you could address how difficult it is when you are an older person — let’s say you are 60 years old and up, and at this point in life not only experiencing the death of dear friends but friends who decide they’re going to move to another part of the country, either to be with their family or just to have a different life as they are older.
How can the ones who are so-called “left behind” manage the difficult loss of people that you’ve been friends with for so many years, and you see all the time, and now at best you can maybe visit them once a year?
Do you have suggestions as to how to cope?
— Thinking and Coping in 60626
Dear Thinking and Coping,
If no one else will admit to relating to this, know that I totally know how you feel. Just last week, I received a text from one of my best friends that made me reflect on the ways things were.
“Smiley three years ago,” said the text, accompanied by a goofy and unflattering photo of me from the time my friend and our other best friend visited me.
We’ve been friends since college, when we watched and quoted random lines from “Titanic” and “Forrest Gump.” (“Ah! Something bit me!”) After graduation, one settled down in San Antonio, one set down roots up in Dallas and I landed in Chicago. Even with us living in three different cities, we keep in contact and always make plans to see each other again. And like you said, it’s at least once a year.
When they visited me, our Dallas friend gave us her pregnancy announcement. We congratulated her, then made the most out of our child-free itinerary.
That cute baby is now a big brother. And as for my San Antonio friend, I used to relate to her the most, at least when it came to not knowing how we felt about commitment or having kids. She is now married, bought a house with her husband and surprised us with her own baby announcement a few weeks ago.
I’m very happy for both of them, but it did leave me thinking about this constant cycle of change we experience every couple of years as adults. And that looming feeling you mentioned about being “left behind,” or at least saying goodbye to the proximity and accessibility that makes friendships easier.
Sometimes responsibilities and commitments are bigger than us, even when leaving is the last thing you want to do, just like I moved 1,000 miles away for better career opportunities.
And while we try to be understanding, those negative thoughts of abandonment may creep in as we meet new potential friends.
“Why bother if one of us may end up moving in the next three to five years anyway?”
But don’t let memories of past friends — whether they’re dead or far away — keep you from making meaningful connections. It’s a lonely world already.
I suggest you cope with reassurance.
Know we make a difference in people’s lives, whether it’s a simple hello and smile as you walk by them at work, or lending an ear for a needed venting session about the latest headache in someone’s lives. Even if some friends are with us through a temporary or transitional phase in their life, that doesn’t mean they don’t need like-minded people to get them through that.
The same goes to our current friends in question. They need us now as mature adults just as much as they did when we were a little more wet behind the ears.
Time and distance can influence relationships, true. But it doesn’t define them.
If we see people we love once a year or once every three months, the best thing to do is cherish those rare moments as much as we can.
Write to Someone in Chicago at someoneinchicago@suntimes.com.