When Friends Go On

Today, while my sisters were out playing, and the rest of my family gone for the afternoon, I talked on the phone with my dear friend Jenn. We've been good friends for years, and in a little less than two weeks, her family is moving back to California.
I'm very sad, because most of my friends live very far away, and sometimes it hurts that I can't easily see them. But as we talked today, I was given a strange feeling: peace. Suddenly, I don't feel so sad when I'm reminded that the twenty-first is their last day in state. I don't feel like crying when I realize that we don't know when we'll ever see each other again.
I was given peace. I remembered: I've already gone through this with Marilyn, and I survived. Sure, I didn't think I would back then, but I found out that life, and our friendship, still went on.
Last night, my parents and I watched Shadowlands, a movie about C.S. Lewis and Helen Joy Gresham. After her death, a friend of his told him that life must go on, to which Lewis replied that it needn't but "I find that it usually does". I guess that's how one must face what one thinks one cannot.
My friends have gone on, but so have the friendships. Just because there are thousands of miles between doesn't make them any less potent or meaningful. But I had to ask God to help me: and He gave me peace to be able to get go.