For a Season

You’re not the friend I thought you were. 

Sometimes, I feel naive and foolish for believing that friendships could span the distance. 3,000+ miles is a long way. I thought that maybe this time it would be different. We raised babies together. We cried together. We laughed (a lot) together. Your family was my family and I loved your kids like my own. Nothing brought me greater joy than knowing that I had someone who “just got it.”

Then it changed. Slowly at first, the way all significant changes happen. Initially, it was just minor enough for me to pay it no attention. Again, 3,000+ miles, so obviously things weren’t the same. Different time zones. Different schedules. Entirely different lives now. I felt like I really tried to keep things the same—or as close to the same as I could with the distance—I texted (because every mama with littles knows that’s the easiest way to keep in touch). I tried Marco Polo a few times. Tried to Facetime here and there. 

Eventually, though, I started to get the clue that what we once had? The friendship we had built? It wasn’t going to stand the test of distance and time like I had hoped that it would. Call me a fool, but I thought we were stronger than that; better than that. 

Get bogged down by time zones? Let the miles keep us apart? Nah, girl. We got this.

I can even hear your voice in my head saying something like that as I write. I have to admit, a part of my heart broke and continues to break each time that I see a post you make on social media  about or with your new “best friend.” Call me childish, but part of me feels the painful sting of jealousy each time. Not jealousy that you have a new best friend, because I know that our family’s sudden relocation sucked for everyone. But, rather jealous that you have a new best friend…and 3,000 miles away, on the other side of the country, I don’t. 

But, you found someone to take my place; someone to vent over coffee with. To share baseball stories and ball park nachos with; someone to laugh with over how ridiculous our group of TEN looks when we go places and someone to just cry with on the days when raising these kids and loving these husbands and doing all the things is just too damn hard. I find myself reaching for the phone often to text you, show you something crazy that Sarah is doing or send a photo of the boys acting like nuts. 

My heart hurts because of it. You told me once that us being here was easier, as long as you knew that we were okay and were happy. I told you that we were and assured you that we were fine. I lied. We—as in our family—are fine. We are happy—in that the kids are healthy and doing well in school and learning and making friends. After almost two years, we are adjusting.

But, me? I am lonely. I miss my best friend. I feel like an outsider whose only invitation feels like a second thought option.  It’s junior high all over again and I’m that girl sitting in the bathroom stall eating lunch by myself. And the only person I want to tell all of that to is you. But, each time I reach and type…I hit delete or put the phone away. 

I’ve sent too many messages that have gone unanswered. I get it. I do. The distance sucks so bad and a piece of my heart breaks every time I realize that life…time…distance…just keeps growing. We’ll never get back the friendship that we had. I know that. And, I think deep down, you know that, too. Maybe it’s just easier this way? Maybe this is just one of those things that was meant to be for a season…maybe we were only meant to walk through a short time together and move on. I had hoped that wasn’t the case, but all signs say otherwise.

But, if down the road, at another time…in another place…our paths cross again, I will smile and laugh and enjoy the time; knowing deep down that in another season, you were the very best friend my heart could have hoped for. Believing with every ounce of my being that if life hadn’t have happened…and 3,000+ miles hadn’t have come between us…we would have continued to raise our babies side by side. Hauling folding chairs, princess toys and baseball bags all over God’s creation. Inhaling chips & queso together, drinking all the coffee and spending countless hours at the beach together. 

You were and always will be the only other person who just gets it with no words needed.

And I will love you forever for it.