Passages.
For all the work of building connections, relationships, and community there is an inevitable slipping of people away to other things, other people, other places. Like most things in life the passing through of people seems to follow no particular course or trend but happens in fits and starts, as isolated incidents, the death of someone special or a good friend moving to a new job, or sometimes altogether, upon graduation or in connection to a breakup. Some of these passages are hard, some bittersweet, and some are surprisingly easy. The ones to pay attention to are the ones that do not feel like loss. The relationships that are the most important to us can weather all kinds of distances and periods of time. These are the friends with whom we pick up right where we left off, regardless of a year without actually being in the same place at the same time. These relationships are the ones that sustain us, they are the people to whom we will turn when things really go awry, and they are the people to whom we should be listening when we need advice. These are the people that we should invest in.
Consider for a moment the people in your life, the relationships to which you tend. Which of them sustain you? Which of them exist solely because of proximity? Try to identify the people that you cannot bear to lose and hold them close before they slip away.
The Beatles, In My Life:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zI0Q8ytD44Y
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http://www.featurepics.com/FI/Thumb300/20101111/Old-Rusty-Chain-Links-1700793.jpg
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