Distance

I recently received a text late one evening from a friend in Chicago. She mentioned a terrible headache and the fear that accompanied it. We talked about headaches, checklisting the various alternative therapies that could possibly relieve some of the pain. I made a passing remark about driving her to the hospital if she really needed it.

Note: We are 914 miles apart (I Google-mapped it) and I don't have a car out here in Denver.

It brought to mind other times when I've made such offers. When I lived in the suburbs, saying something like that was merely unreasonable. Now it's impossible. I feel strangely disconnected from all those people and places back in Illinois. The nature of my existence is such that I really only recognize the sheer physical distance between me and there, but it is still a very wide gulf. These people are a mere phone call away, and with Facebook and Myspace, I'm never really disconnected.

I talk to friends back at Aurora, and they recount the occasional banal details of college life. I know that people still climb the stairs in Eckhart Hall. I know that they still travel north (the term is "head up Randall") to shop. All of this occurs, as it did before, as it will in the future, without me there.

As Tony Prima would say, "Life goes on without me."

Keep going, life.