My friend passed away yesterday. Oldest, best, consistent. Where context has been built over so much time that you are always mid-conversation. Whether it'd be a couple of days or months between contacting each other, it didn't feel like it because she just was and we just were. Over the last year, spending more time with her, wishing it hadn't taken life-altering circumstances to do so.
A few weeks ago I was looking for an old picture of us to quickly print and put on the photo wall by her bed, and I remembered the shout out post to her in this blog. Since then I've been reading and re-reading that post. Last night I went through texts between us saved on my phone. 6 years of texts. She was so funny and witty and made me feel funny and witty. I knew her for 43 years. You're born into a family, but friends choose each other. She was the person who chose me the longest, and the person I chose the longest. I've been thinking about how when you lose people, it's like a double, triple, quadruple hit. You just keep realizing the hits. You lose the opportunity for more of them, you lose their perspective on the world and how they make your life richer because of it. You lose the shared reminiscing, and the part of yourself that only they held. The memories, the understanding, the ability to reflect and reference and help you orient your future because they were there for your past.
My mom said she pictures our connections to people like hundreds of strings going out from us to them, and connecting everyone together. I'm trying to figure out what it looks like when one of the longest strings is cut, when I always thought it would be twice as long. Janey, I wish you were here for me to talk to about it. I miss you.
