Sorry Elton John. Sorry doesn’t seem to be the hardest word. For me, goodbye is. There are a handful variations of goodbyes in the English language – farewell, see you, and even the shortened form bye to name a few. Farewell signifies wishing the other party well as we part ways; see you implies till we meet again. But goodbye has a different connotation – saying goodbye suggests we won’t be meeting for good.

Due to the nature of my work, I get into these kind of situations rather often. Being stationed across different business locations, I work closely with the people on the ground. But just as I get to know them well, it’s time to move on to the next location. And the longer I spend interacting with them, the harder it is when the time to say goodbye comes. So, I don’t like to say goodbye when that time arrives, because goodbye is forever.

In times like this, I prefer to leave quietly to spare myself the emotions. And to avoid going through this over and over again, I figured it’ll be better to not overstay my welcome and keep relationships strictly professional. So forgive me if I appear distant or aloof because I don’t wish to say goodbye eventually; so if there are no hellos, then there wouldn’t be goodbyes.