Monday, August 8, 2011

Friends... Forever

What's a Friendship without fights? What's a Friendship without arguments? What's a Friendship without compromises?

Friends are supposed to understand what you don't say. Friends are supposed to advise when you are off the track. Friends are supposed to keep quite when you are mad. Friends are supposed to be there for you, all the time, no matter how busy they are.

But things change with time. You might not be in contact with your best pal from your childhood. You might have forgotten the name of your best friend in school. And the best friend from college, well, you might just call him up a few times in a year, perhaps on his birthday, or the new year.

Nobody has a single best friend. At-least, I don't have one. They kept changing, all the time, from the childhood days, to school, then college, and now at workplace. The concept of a "Best Friend" is a little flawed for me, at-least I feel so. I believe that, at a given moment, a person can have a pool of good friends, and it becomes almost impossible for one, to chose the best among them.

It might sound as if, today, on the occasion of "Friendship Day", I am trying to make all my friends happy. Well, in a way, Yes. I thank all of them who have considered me as a "Friend", but, also, those who have considered me as their "Best Friend" at some point of time.

I think I can list down a few friends who have been in my pool of good friends.

  1. My Sisters (Mausumi, Sushmita): Well, obviously, they have to be among them. Had the best of times when we were children at home.
  2. Hara Prasad Sahoo: He was one of the first who I met in Stewart School, and we were perhaps best friends till Class 4
  3. Santrupta Mishra: We quickly became best friends in Class 4 and stayed Best Friends till 10th.
  4. Shyam Bedback: In college, most of the times, we were seen with each other. Does that mean we were best friends? Perhaps.
  5. Samiran Rautray, Ritesh Parida, Ashutosh Bag, Sidharth Gourav Nayak, Kapidhwaja Pratap Narayan Singh (Hope I spelled is correctly): Bet friends in the first year of engineering. Ragging was so fun in the first year. The whole year, we all sort of stayed together all the time.
  6. Rishabh Kalra, Saurabh Shukla, Vivek Bhagbole: In addition to the first year friends, the pool kept getting bigger and bigger, and by the time it was my last year in engineering, the boundaries "Circles" of good friends started melting away.
  7. Kunal Kishore Malviya, Vijay Kumar, Vivek Dwivedi, Rwitam Mitra, Sagar Mohane, Vinay Suri, Vishal Jain: All of them started to break the boundaries.
  8. Nitin Chhabra, Gaurav Paul, Shakul Jugran, Sandesh Kothare, Rahul Jain: Well, those were the close group of friends with whom I spent most of my time in the initial days in Bangalore.
  9. A few more which don't really fall into that chronological order: Amit Chahar, Vidushi Goyal, Rwitam Mitra, Debasis Biswal, Rajesh Jena, Santhosh Joshua, Padmaja Dash, Shantanu Singh, Vandana Toshniwal
And the list goes on and on and on.  I just can't really put every friends' names down here. Actually, it's a little unfair on my part, if I have left out anyone. But, I could, very clearly see the pattern emerging. The pool of good friends becomes bigger and bigger with your age. And, thus, the concept of having a "Best Friend" is diluted once you are exposed to such a large number of good friends. Sometimes, you can't make up your mind and pick a better friend among a two. At times, you will have to make a few compromises. It has frequently happened to me, that 2 from those friends would call you up and ask you to catch up for a movie. And now, you have to make a choice. When you make a choice, it's definitely hard for you, and it is perhaps hurts the other guy who you ignored. I also, feel the same, when such things happen to me. But then, everything is forgiven and forgotten soon, and then, the next weekend, you get to go with the other friend. And everyone seems to be happy now.

Ah!!! Ok, fine, Let's end this day here. By the way, A very Happy Friendship Day to all my friends, and I hope that I am always there in your "Circles" as a good friend. Don't ever think that I have stopped being a Friend of yours. Even if I don't call you often, even if I don't wish you on your birthdays, even if I have forgotten your last names. I still think about you all when I rest my mind. I still have dreamed about a few. It's just that Life has taken a toll on me, and that I have many many more friends to talk to, and keep my circle growing.

Thanks all, again, for being a FRIEND. Happy Friendship Day.

By the way: Did you notice? That list contains only 3 girl friends, apart from my sisters. I want to make as many girl friends as the boy friends I have. So, anyone interested on growing their pool of friends, please contact me.

18 comments:

  1. i'm happy ( and a little relieved ) to be in the list . Happy Friendship day ! we both need a resolution to call our friends more often than usual.

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  2. @saurabh: Well, You might forget me. Mr. Sahay, but, I can't ever forget you.

    Yeah, And this year, you forgot my birthday, remember? And my gift as well.

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  3. Me in the list.. Sahi sahi...
    Psycho, were you drunk when you wrote this post?

    BTW it takes courage to name few folks and leaving few fuming, chalo u did atleast one daring act ;) And yeah If your appeal, for female friends, produces some significant output than let me know, I might try that as well ;)

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  4. @Vishal: No I wasn't drunk. Anyway, as and when people complain about their names not being on the list, I will keep adding them. :)

    As for the appeal, Well, till now, no success.

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  5. Best Friends..I think is just a notion in mind. Understanding is more important. I, for one, would never reveal a list on a social website. :)

    Lets just take comfort in knowing, that we have a few chosen ones, who choose to be our friend and who continue to be our friend, despite our so many flaws and egos. Friends let us be just us and listening to us when we want to speak and occasionally advising on matters of love and life, when they themselves have no idea, what they are talking about.

    Cheers. :)

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  6. @Kunnu: Yep, Thanks for adding up.

    Coming to the list, actually, I wanted to write about a few chosen ones who mattered the most. But, soon I realized, the list would be really really big. So, I ended up putting up all the names that I could think of.

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  7. "Its really nice to be in your list and you would be in my list for ever...", U Rock Dude....!!!

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  8. M happy to be in ur list.... :)
    Thanks for the band... :)

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  9. @Vidushi: Hope I am there in your list. The band was rather demanded. Anyway, you are welcome.

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  10. Waah beta ab Neha Gupta ko nahi jante ho!!! sahi hai....

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  11. kya baat hai....point maarne lag gaya hai tu to!!!! bt fir bhi daal de yaar, khush ho jayegi beechari...

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