Everyone who leaves your life opens a subtle trail of loss that still connects you with that person. When you think of these people, miss them, and want to be with them, your heart journeys out along that trail to where they now are. There are whole regions of absence in every life. Losing a friend is the most frequent experience of absence. When you open yourself to friendship, you create a unique and warm space between you. The tone and shape of this space is something you share with no one else. Your friend struck a note in the chamber of your heart that no one else could reach. The departure of the friend leaves this space sore with loss, some innocence within you is unwilling or unable to accept that one you gathered so close is now gone. It is the longing for the departed friend that makes the absence acute. Absence haunts you and makes your belonging sore.
Absence is never clear-cut; it reveals the pathos of human being. Physically each person is a singular, limited object. However, considered effectively, there are myriad pathways reaching outwards and inwards from your heart. The true nature of individuality is not that of an isolated identity; it is rather this active kinship with the earth and with other humans. When distance or separation opens, this connection is not voided—rather, the departed friend is now present in a different way. He is no longer near physically, in touch, voice, or presence. But the sore longing of his absence somehow still keeps him spiritually near. Longing holds pathways open to the departed; it does not erase people. Absence is one of the loneliest forms of longing, and when you feel the absence of someone, you still belong with the person in some secret way. There is a subtle psychic arithmetic in the world of belonging.