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Making friends and saying goodbye

If you have read some of my other posts, you will know I grew up in the military. You make friends along the way, but you move so often and lose contact with them. I met friends who had grown up with many of the friends they had. I always wished I could have also grown up with friends and didn’t have to say goodbye every few years!

It was a lonely feeling moving to new places and having to make new friends. I was the only child until I was nine, and was very shy. Even though I was shy, I still was able to make friends quickly.

We moved three times during my high school years to 3 different states! From California to Washington and Colorado. When you become a teenager it is even harder to leave your friends. I was always a good student, which helped to learn in different curriculums in each state, but the moves affected me emotionally each time we moved.

Working and making longtime friends

My parents retired in Denver, so I was able to live there and get a job where I was a waitress and made some wonderful friends. This was in the early ’70s. Now that I was working I was able to move in with some friends.

Not all the girls I waitressed with while living in Colorado still live in Denver, and I have not seen them in about 10 years too. We planned on meeting in Colorado last year, but I had just retired and could not afford to make the trip. Miss and love these ladies!

I left Denver in 1976, as I married young but found out he was abusive so I filed for divorce, and decided to move back to California where I had stayed in contact with someone I went to school with.

I became employed and made new friends. Within a few years, I met and married my second husband and we had a son within a year. I would fly or drive back to Colorado to see my parents and sisters, usually once a year. One sister met someone from Alaska, so she moved to Alaska with him and married him. We did fly out for the wedding.

Living many miles from my sisters

My younger sister had moved to Arizona and after many years she found someone from Ohio and moved there to be with her partner. She is still living there. When our parents were alive we would all meet in Colorado at their house. Once they passed away, we didn’t see each other for years at a time.

We did meet for a family reunion in Colorado nine years ago, but since then I haven’t seen my sister in Alaska for many years. She remarried and moved to Florida with her new husband. We thought we would see each other more often, but that never happened. We did meet my younger sister in Las Vegas and at Super Bowl 50, so we have tried to get together as much as we could.

It has been four years, and we were all going to meet in Alaska for my nephew’s wedding at the beginning of July. Now that the coronavirus pandemic has placed most of the US under stay-at-home orders, I doubt the planes will be flying that soon, and I won’t feel comfortable getting on a plane for a long time! I guess we will have to make other plans to try and meet in the future.

Looking to reconnect after the pandemic

Once we get through this pandemic, I keep hearing it is going to be a different normal than what we were used to, and that a second wave will be coming and we need to prepare for it. I believe that God has a plan for us, so I guess making plans and traveling will also be a different norm.

I love and miss my family and wish we lived closer to each other. I know everyone is busy and have different lives to live and trying to coordinate a trip on the same time schedule is hard to do.

It seems that as time goes on it is easier to drift apart and that communicating on social media becomes a habit and enough until we find a way to get together in person. We use to schedule phone calls, and even those were canceled.

“You can kiss your family and friends goodbye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.”     

Frederick Buechner

In closing

Family and friends are an important part of our lives. They give us love and support during the good and bad times, and a shoulder to cry on when needed. Friends can come and go and it is a joint effort to keep the relationship strong. The saying goes, ” You can pick your friends but you can’t pick your family”.

We might disagree with family members at times as we grow up, and at times it could create a point where we don’t talk to each other. Life is too short to hold a grudge, so we need to get over it and agree to disagree. We should be there for each other no matter what!

We are all human and make mistakes and have busy lives, but remember that life can be taken from us at any time. Learn to forgive and see the best in people, and don’t make excuses for why you can’t get together with them. Socializing is such an important part of connecting with other humans and our mental health.

It can be a struggle to see family and friends who live many miles away! I am hoping with all the social distancing and the stay-at-home orders we have been through, we can finally figure out a way to make a sincere effort to get together in person. Time will tell!

Do you have family members or friends who live in other states or are more than a two-hour drive? If so how often do you see them or communicate through social media or your cell phone? Let them know you love them and plan a time to get together when we get the green light to socialize again.

If you want to show your family or friends that you are thinking of them, below are some frames found on Amazon, along with pictures you might have taken to make special gifts of lifetime memories!

If you found this post helpful, please share it with family and friends and on social media. Scroll down to the comment section as comments are appreciated.

Here is another post you might find interesting – Relationships With Neighbors or Co-workers

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See you soon, Denise

Posts may contain affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases and collect a small commission at no cost to you. This helps my blog to keep going. Thank you! For more info, read my disclosure policy.