I recently received a text from my friend, Eileen, who I hadn’t spoken to in a while. “Hey! I hope you’re doing well,” she texted. “I feel weird sending this out of the blue, but I thought you’d be interested.” She then provided the juiciest gossip about our former coworker. I couldn’t respond fast enough. “OMG,” I quickly typed, “Don’t feel weird sending me the most fascinating thing I’ve seen in a month! You can text me anytime and I’d love it, but this is particularly good!”
After my PCS move four years earlier, Eileen and I were no longer in a regular texting habit, but I was genuinely thrilled to see her name pop up on my phone. The reality is, I never stop loving my friends, even after one of us moves away.
PCS moves make this happen far more often than I’d like. I have to say goodbye to friends I love and who love me — people who shared my confidences, made me laugh, supported me and were central to my life. I am never ready to let go of them, and, frankly, I just won’t. We might not live close, but I will do my best to stay close.
My first line of friendship defense is, of course, texting and social media. I will text, like, comment and send memes with no hesitation to any friend, no matter how long it’s been since we last communicated. I know my reaction when I receive a meme from a friend: I love that something reminded them of me; I love that they thought to hit send, and I love the opportunity to connect even if only for a few seconds. I’ve decided to go through my life assuming all my friends feel the same, so I hit send with no self-consciousness. At least they know I thought of them.
I also believe in being an active group-text participant. One of my group chats, “MomTalk,” is a subset of a larger group: just those of us with young kids. We met in DC, but now we’re texting from DC, New Jersey, Illinois and North Carolina, laughing and commiserating about early motherhood. Today, I texted them a picture of my toilet with a big lizard hanging out in it. Although none of them could come to my actual aid, their reactions were funny (“Did your son try to keep it?”), and their support gave me the bravery to rescue the potty lizard. I didn’t feel quite so alone in that weird moment.
My true secret weapon, when it comes to keeping in touch, is the 20-minute phone call. Sometimes when a friend calls, I feel overwhelmed because I don’t have 90 minutes for a massive catch-up. But I started calling my sisters while driving to pick up my son from his pre-K, about 18 minutes from our house. The phone calls were perfect. The natural time limit took out the pressure to fully catch up, and we could just talk.
Then, in one of my larger group chats, a friend joked that they never needed the actual phone app. I responded that I make lots of calls because what do they expect me to do during pre-K drop-off and pickup? Sit with my own thoughts? I then jokingly sent my driving schedule and offered slots if anyone wanted to talk to me for 20 minutes. To my surprise, a friend I’d never been on personal call terms with took me up on it and claimed the next slot. When the day came, I called him as scheduled during my drive to pre-K. For 20 minutes, we chatted easily and laughed about the idiosyncrasies of our respective in-laws and discovered a shared love of 2010s indie music. It was fun, and I truly felt closer to him by the end of the call.
I won’t pretend that friendships stay the same following a PCS move, but they definitely do not end. Staying in touch can feel overwhelming, but I’ve found the reality is much simpler. A text takes a few seconds. A quick car ride can be a fun call. And friendship can be forever.
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