'The absence of absence'

Short entry for today. I wrote a song my senior year of college that contained the following lyric:

"Soon we'll be parted and who knows for how long,

but I take consolation in this

In the Mystical Body He'll be keepin us strong,

and I'll see you in the Eucharist".

In these post-college years, my nearest and dearest friends are (as I'm sure I've mentioned once or twice) for the most part, scattered around the country. There are only a handful of good friends left in Michigan, and less than half that handful take up residence in this little town where I'm living. I miss that "posse" of friends that waited like a family in the caf every night for dinner in college. I miss sharing a drafty old house with two of the most fun women I've ever known. I miss silly nights when my oldest friend and I had nothing better to do than waste time trying on 80s prom dresses and jumping on the trampoline together. Hours of entertainment, really.

Somehow- even though I rarely get to see the people I love, I manage to do alright. I don't feel that I'm ever REALLY terribly apart from them. I could credit this 'absence of absence' with the fact that we live in such a technological age - with cell phones, texting, and facebook at our very fingertips. The real reason, however, is because they are present to me whenever I receive Holy Communion. In receiving Christ; body, blood, soul, and divinity - I also receive His Mystical Body, the Church. So whenever I go to Mass and receive the Eucharist, I am as close to my friends as I could hope to be in this life. In the moments when I DO feel the lack of someone's physical presence, this thought gives me comforting strength.

Kate, Heidi, Jess, Spin, Andrea, Darby - I miss you guys. Thank God for the telephone, but thank Him even more for the Church and the dimension of your presence it brings.