Fine, Leave!

One of my coworkers is leaving today. This is upsetting news (that I've known about for 3 weeks) because a) she's really awesome and b) I'm the one who's going to be absorbing most of her work until she is replaced in approximately 1,000 years. We just had her little farewell party in which I was dragged into a ton of pictures. Thanks to technology, I was instantly made aware of how fleshy my face is starting to look in close-range flash photos. So that was... neat.

Anyway, I didn't come here to talk about my fat face for a change. I came here to express my guilt at sneaking out of the party a few minutes early and my further guilt that I am planning to also sneak out of work a few minutes early, all in the name of avoiding saying goodbye.

I hate saying goodbye. That's not uncommon, I guess, but the reason I hate it is not because it's hard, but because it's so easy.

Crap, she's coming.

Ok, that wasn't so bad. Anyway, goodbyes are one of those social conventions I've never been able to wrap my head around and have therefore always awkwardly stumbled my way through. No matter how close (or not close) I am to someone, saying goodbye never feels real to me. Somebody's staying and somebody's going, and you'll both have lives for better or for worse or possibly for exactly the same quality. Either you will stay in contact or you won't, you'll think of each other a lot or you won't... so what's it all about?

Actually, I can answer that. It's about acknowledging the role you've played in each other's lives and expressing mutual sadness that things are ending. But nothing's ending, really. At least not the important part, right?

I guess I feel that if something is coming to an end, the separation happens in the goodbye itself. All the "I'm gonna miss you!" and "Stay in touch!" and "Take care of things while I'm away!" and "I'm gonna miss you most of all!" -- to me -- create this sense of finality that doesn't need to exist. It makes me feel more separate from a person than a simple "Alright. *hugs* See ya!" would. The emotional send-off is a tactic to help your brain make a clean (and therefore easier to handle) break and prepare for oncoming changes, but since I don't feel that somebody leaving is equivalent to something ending, it seems more the cause of a separation than a necessary coping mechanism for same. The strength of stoicism to me indicates an honest belief in the permanence of a relationship despite changes in proximity and circumstance. (And that's not to say I won't miss someone after they're gone.)

But I know that everybody handles and interprets things differently, and that's where my sense of guilt comes from. I don't do the tearful goodbye, though many people genuinely need it. I'd rather say "Good luck to you, talk soon, tweet me!" and be done with it. I know that comes off as cold, but I also refuse to affect emotion for the sake of fulfilling some sort of social code because that never helps anything. Hence: avoidance, which... also never helps anything. Whatever, I'm not perfect.

Ok I'm leaving bye.