i hate goodbye's

Life has its ways of making us realize how important people are to us. Unfortunately, most of the time, you don't realize how much you actually had in a person until they are gone. Abraham Lincoln once said "the better part of one's life consists of his friendships." That statement is very true, and it certainly is true of the friends in my life. They do make up one of the "better" parts of my life. Growing up as childhood friends, my best friend Rachel and I may as well have been sisters. Yes, we fought like sisters, and we loved like sisters. When Rachel married her high school sweet heart David, and I married Matthew a year later, our childhood friendship just picked up right where it left off, only this time, it was better. We both got to share it with the ones we loved the most, and we definitely became closer through the last three years. Just last week we helped load up the last of the moving truck and see them off to California. It was a sad moment, and yes, a few tears were shed, but that's part of life that is supposed to happen. People move, their families grow, and childhood friends rarely stay so close together for ever. I guess we were lucky to be able to be so close for all these years. They will always be close - no matter how far away.