The Geography of Friendship

I spoke today with a colleague I’ll call E, a man I’ve known for nearly three decades. In passing, I asked about D, our retired colleague, who’d always seemed to be E’s closest companion on campus. E didn’t hesitate: “Haven’t seen him since he retired four years ago.” I was floored. For thirty years I’d watched them laugh in hallways, share office gossip, and linger in each other’s doorways. To me, they were inseparable. To E, apparently, they were work buddies on a time clock. Now? His friends are his neighbors. Brutal clarity, no sentimentality.

I didn’t judge him, though I did wince. I had mistaken their daily collisions for lifelong intimacy. What E reminded me of—casually, almost cheerfully—is the old truth: out of sight, out of mind. My ego resists this; I prefer to imagine I leave such an indelible mark that absence alone couldn’t erase me. But who am I kidding? Friendship is built on repetition and proximity, not myth. Remove the daily face-to-face, and even the warmest ties cool into background noise.

Romantic love, of course, cheats this law. Passion bends molecules. Couples endure years of distance with letters, FaceTime, and masochistic longing. But friendship? Friendship doesn’t migrate well. It doesn’t live in the bloodstream. It lives in the cafeteria, the break room, the neighbor’s driveway. In other words, friendship needs geography. Love can survive exile; friendship needs a shared zip code.