Of friends and friends...

Last Diwali, we had just moved back to India, specifically Delhi. It is hard to believe a year has already passed since then and here I am now in the last month of the year, still wondering how the months flew.


Settling back in India was not a breeze.  Sadly most things which i enjoyed, like blogging came to a standstill. My mind seemed always in a volatile mood and it was not easy to keep it still long enough and write my thoughts all down .


Then not so recently I got a lovely email from a college friend , L.


Among the many things she wrote, was "Are you going to give me lame excuses for not updating your blog or do you just want to spare yourself the trouble by posting something? "


erm...yeah, she can be very subtle :)


so here i am posting.


This post's for you, L, for always giving that wallop...erm..little nudge, when I need it. 


Funny thing is L and I were nothing but nodding acquaintances in college, and I sort of used to compete with her as far as English was concerned, *in my mind. I always used to think that she would become an author or something close to that.


After college, we went our separate ways, and were nothing but reminders of another age, another era, another world. 


Then years and years later, we both got 'facebooked' . It brought back college memories, past teachers and a lot of "wow, you look good" comments. 


I have this nice feeling about this developing friendship, not because she writes the nicest stuff about my writing but because I feel she is a lot like me. We are both nearing our forties, we have teenage sons and hence similar apprehensions and we don't write to each other much. 


It probably needs some nurturing, because we both are also erratic writers. I go through this phase of intense communication then suddenly i get into my 'hibernate' mode, because mostly i have nothing useful to say. I am a pathetic emailer and I guess she is too. 


Even then, I feel that if we were to spend a few days together, we would feel at home, reading books, just enjoying the silence, and talking because we needed to , not because we HAD to.


I remember in Dubai, I was quite content to keep to myself and indulge in things that I wanted to do. I had made up my mind that I had no time in investing in new friendships when I knew that I was not going to be in Dubai for ever. And yet I made two very good friends. It is the kind of friendship which I like best. Where we knew that we were there for each other when needed and we didn't keep tabs on who did what for whom.


I have this lovely friend in Delhi, who always makes me feel good about myself, and who never lets me put myself down. 


I've had an ex college mate landing up at my old house in Bangalore trying to find out where I was. These are surprises I love.


I've had people who thought that being friends meant also keeping tabs on favors. I wish I could let them understand that, when you don't a put a price on the friendship, you reap greater benefits. Sometimes, the person cannot return your favor, and it is not fair to make him/her feel guilty about that. It makes me value a home-cooked meal sent over when I'm unwell, that much more, when i know that it has not been recorded in a 'good favor' book to be recalled on a later day. 


I've been told that I come across as a very social person. Which I find uncomfortable, because I think I 'suck' at social talk. 


That is why perhaps, the internet is such a scarily comforting place to be in, you can be your worst, but none will ever know it.


Just goes to show that you can't plan friendships, they just happen. In perhaps the same way, this post happened unplanned!


Now I better go and shoo the Murphy guy away, he's proving to be too friendly for my good!