Losing a friend
(This post contains major spoilers for the TV show: The Four Seasons)
My wife recently found out that one of her friends from college just had their first child. She came by this knowledge from another friend mentioning it in passing - the new parent had sent them an email. My wife checked her email and was sad to not have been similarly informed. It felt like she had lost this connection to her once-friend.
We recently finished the TV adaptation of The Four Seasons which features three middle-aged couples going on a handful of vacations together. In the first two of eight episodes, Steve Carrell's character divorces his spouse and the remaining vacations include Carrell's new girlfriend, which causes various tensions for the rest of the cast. The show culminates with Carrell dying in an accident off-screen and the remaining characters dealing with the emotional fallout.
As my wife was telling me about her sadness over losing her friend, my mind juxtaposed the emotions of the friend group sad to lose Steve Carrell. And I thought, how much better to have lost a friend to the difficulties of growing apart rather than unexpected death. To be happy for someone having their first child even if they are no longer in your life. I shared this with my wife and she agreed that this framing feels much better.