Goodbyes: Of the real and fictional variety

I'm only two episodes away from finishing Broad City. It's one of my favorite shows, I've even talked about it on my blog before. The closer I get to finishing it, the more I dread reaching the end — because this time when I'm done, I'm really done. I tend to get this way whenever I find myself emotionally invested in a TV show or a good book. We feel like the characters have become our friends and the plots are experiences we go through together, and we don't want that to end.

It's particularly fitting that I reflect on this on this particular week. Ben and I finally know where we'll be moving to in two short weeks and in the near future, I'll start boxing things up. My wonderful roommate Kelsey is moving to Bristol, Connecticut in a matter of weeks. Her belongings and her two wonderful cats will be leaving our house even sooner. Goodbyes, I'm remembering, are hard.

Saying goodbye to shows and to books is hard because we know we won't have any more "firsts" with them. There won't another new episode to watch, or another new chapter to read. We can't experience heartbreak, joy, trials, triumphs with our fictional friends. (That is, unless, they pull a Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life). But we can always go back and rewatch or reread the things that bring us comfort. It won't be quite the same, but it still provides that feeling of reuniting with a familiar, comforting thing.

I frequently fall asleep to Parks + Recreation. It's optimistic, familiar and calming to me. Leslie Knope and the rest of the crew in Pawnee seem like old friends to me at this point. So as sad as it was to approach the end of that series on the first watch, I know I'm only saying goodbye to the sense of newness, not the characters as a whole.

Real-life goodbyes are not so easy.

Most goodbyes come with the hope of seeing one another again, and staying in touch until then. But you can never really know. It's your responsibility before the goodbyes to take in all the moments — taking mental snapshots along the way — so you can look back on those moments like rewatching an episode of your favorite TV show.