Lexitechnia

Mark Antony to Cicero (Ad Atticum 14.13a):

Occupationibus est factum meis et subita tua profectione ne tecum coram de hac re agerem. Quam ob causam vereor ne absentia mea levior sit apud te.

It happened that because of my business and your sudden departure that I couldn’t pursue this matter with you in person, so I worry that, due to my being away, it might seem less important to you.

This first example of absentia ‘absence’ suggests the word has broader application than its English descendant: he writes that the absentia is his, even though it is Cicero who has left, while ‘absence’ seems to be more suggestive of being away from a place where one should be, than of merely being distant from a person.

It might be more natural to write ‘my not being with you’ or such, but the repetition of “with you… with you… to you” wouldn’t go well at all. Probably the best way to write it would be to trim out one mention of their not meeting face to face:

…I couldn’t pursue this with you in person; I worry that because of this it might seem less important to you.

But that wouldn’t be suitable to show how absentia is translated.

[For absentia.]