Goodbye my friend

I am suddenly faced with losing a friend.

It is a very sad day and my heart aches.

I have never really had a friend move so far away before. Mostly, the people that have left have moved to South Carolina, Florida, another part of Georgia or New York. This side of the nation.

One of my best friends came to me the other day and said the words I told myself she would not say: "We're moving to Denver."

GULP..."When", I respond.

"In 2 weeks."

I have cried ever since. Anytime I hear her voice, look at a picture, or think about us drifting apart, I crumble.

BOOM! My life has changed and my friendship is changing - and I am left struggling to find the good in it. I have spent the last couple of weeks thinking about "The Secret" and hearing how you should be grateful for all your experiences and pain because you never know what it can bring. I guess I always thought of it as letting go and appreciating the bad or toxic things in your life because they are there to teach you something. Bad jobs, toxic relationships or negative people.

But I never thought of that applying to loosing the good things?

If something is good in your life...truly good and healthy... like a solid long-standing friendship that you adore and depend on for some sanity. Then, why do those things have to change? What does that teach me? Does it make a space for someone new?

Well - I don't want anyone new.

No one new can take the place of 20 years.

I just want my best friend here with me. A friend who has shared all my pain, joy tears and laughs since I graduated from high school. A friend who had her first baby one day before I had mine. A friend who is listed in our will as partly responsible for my daughter. A friend who shares my love of reading and writing. A friend unlike no other and irreplaceable. A friend that I want to to laugh with and love and be there for the little things that others don't get to see or that go unnoticed.

Now, we won't be there for those things. I won't be able to run over and cry on her shoulder when I need to. I won't be able to watch my daughter and her son grown up together.

My whole family looses the most special family that we spend our time and weekends with. Our extended family - one of my daughter's emergency contacts.

After 20 years, my best friend that is moving across the United States.

Just like that, in only 2 weeks, we move from seeing each other once a week to once a year? I just can't fathom that.

I feel a HUGE sense of loss. My other friends are encouraging me to try and hide my feelings and be happy for her. I am trying so hard to do that. I know her husband is happy and I love that. I know she is happy to be moving back to Denver to be with another close friend she grew up with. I know she is happy for her family.

But - I don't know how to find happiness in this situation for me. I know it is not all about me. I am just left with an empty space in my heart that I don't feel can ever be filled.

I don't know how to be happy for her. I don't know how to feel grateful knowing a friendship is changing dramatically. A friendship I loved just the way it was.

A friendship that will never be the same.