Healing

My parents once had a small bit of artwork, a small, embroidered tapestry that said "Old friends never die, they just move away." There was a little mailbox on it. How cute. Moving is, in many ways, like death. It's incomparable on the grand scale, but in some smaller but significant ways, it is like death. It certainly changes the dynamics of a relationship. Relationships all change with proximity. Frequency and intimacy of contact radically shift; sadly, the relationship appears to be an inverse relationship - less frequent, less intimate with the greater the distance, instead of more frequent, more intimate. That is just reality - life's realpolitik. For those amorously inclined, the Long Distance Relationship imposes greater obligations to communicate with each other. For friends and friendly acquaintances, the time spent usually seems to winnow away to frequent bouts of Nothing, and highly infrequent contact. It's like someone dying - you have the memory, but you access it less and less as time passes by. But the way it is like death, for me, tonight, is this - it becomes a time to heal wounds and mend fences/bridges. Moving is such a cataclysmic thing, because relationships can be so very personal. Changes like this that upset the dynamic, where a dynamic dies, can prompt a typical human reaction to make peace before dying. Of course, the truly vindictive among us won't have such a feeling. They are so self-consumed that it's a wonder they interact with anyone. I'm happy to say that that isn't the case tonight. I had a conversation with the girl in my small group from church who had been upset with me for reasons I couldn't divine. I couldn't figure out for the life of me what it was that was bothering her; I had a clue, but I didn't have any idea of the scale. I will probably post about the particular subject later, since I'm a fairly long-winded blogger and going down that tangent would keep me up all night. (At least I'm honest, eh?) Anyhow, she managed to articulate the problem and we worked things out. The 800-pound gorilla is gone, and we understand each other a little better. Thank God, because things were getting really weird. I'm glad that's over, and we can just enjoy each other's friendship and be really good to one another without reservation. Another bridge I hope to heal is with another gf I had a falling out with last year. It was so dumb, because I was being stubborn about something - being controlled by irrational fear. She was calling me on it, I was trying to rationalize it, and things fell apart. What a mess. Radio silence to the extreme. Well, we happen to read each other's blogs and keep up with the other's life that way. Odd, but true. But it's good, because Time, the great physician, may have intervened long enough to make amends. Will we ever reach the level of closeness we used to have? Time will tell. But the move has sparked some communication and we are shooting to have lunch next week. That's as good a start as any. I got a fortune cookie a couple of weeks ago that said "Time, nature, and patience are the three great physicians." Very true. Now I also hope the one that says "You will spend old age in comfort and material wealth" is true too. :D