Living far away from your best friend feels like a constant tugging at your heartstrings. When your bestie is in another province, the distance isn’t just measured in kilometers but in moments missed, hugs that cannot happen, and laughter that now echoes through phone lines instead of across a shared couch. You might only get to see them every few years, and while those reunions are brimming with joy, they’re also bittersweet because they remind you of all the time apart.

That describes my friendship with my best friend perfectly. We met working in radio way back in our early 20’s. We were both evening announcers. I think we had a year of living in the same town, and getting to spend all of our time together. She was in my wedding party. Then the day after I got married, she moved to Ontario with her boyfriend (luckily a good friend of mine and my husband’s). They have been in Ontario ever since, 14 years, and we have been so far away in Saskatchewan.

We’ve managed to see each other every few years over the last decade, but it is never enough. And now, we each have two kids, two girls for her, and two boys for me. Our families got to spend this past long weekend together. And yes it was so bittersweet. This was the first time we got to meet her youngest girl, and they got to meet our 4 year old for the first time. The whole thing was so bittersweet. It felt like no time had passed at all. There were tears, excitement, joy, and intense sadness that its never enough time.

We kept talking about with our kids, which colour had control over our board in our brain (from Inside Out) mine was a lot of blue and orange! My 6 year old kept saying, when will we see them again. And my response was, lets start planning our 2025 trip to Ontario RIGHT NOW!

For those of you whose bestie lives close, I am SO jealous! You are very lucky. -Tonya Cherry-