I am sure all of you will agree that there is always a special bond with your childhood friends . The
beauty of this friendship is that no matter how much time you have spent apart,
seeing each other again simply means picking up where you have left off and you
can just dive right back in. You know, understand and relate to each other on a
level that others simply can’t understand . Not even your mother. Not even your
spouse.
I am lucky to have a handful of school friends whom I remain
close to even now. This is about one of these friends who is my best friend, my
soul sister, my 3 AM friend. We even share the same name and zodiac ( our
birthdays are just 4 days apart) and have shared the same bench in school for
so many years.
I have known her from the age of four when we were both in
LKG and we have literally grown up together sharing all our secrets, awkward
phases, heartbreaks and triumphs. We have gone through some tough times
together, we have gone through some tough times apart, but what has remained
constant is that we have always been there for each other along the way - the
good times, and the bad, and the boring in-between. That’s what true friendship
is about right?
We know the dynamics of each other’s families and over the
years she became a part of my family and me a part of hers . There is no room
for pretense with her. She can catch the slightest change of tone in my voice
over the phone and I can’t brush her off and say “ It's nothing…” when she asks what
is wrong. I think both of us are acutely aware who the other person is and
continue to understand each other even though life has taken us in different
directions. She knows me inside out - my flaws, my upbringing, my weaknesses,
my journey. Our relationship is about mutual respect, love, and understanding . We are part of each other’s lives and want to
be so in future as well, however it may evolve.
After graduating from high school, we both went on our
different ways – I took engineering and she took medicine and later migrated to
different parts of the country for jobs. In fact, I remember being so worried
that we would drift apart and had made a very emotional new year card for her
in high school. I couldn’t imagine how we would stay close when we were in
different colleges , different friends and is not meeting each other daily. And
that was a time when we didn’t have WhatsApp or Facebook or even mobile
phones. But here we are, 25 years later
and we are still best friends. Our friendship is still as strong as ever.
Of course, I have
made countless other friends along the way, who didn’t share the same bench as
me in school, but still play a valuable role in my life today. I do cherish
them, but that doesn’t change the fact that they don’t know me, or understand
me, in the same way as she does.
Dhanya, it is very difficult to end this blog because there’s surely a million reasons I
would want to thank you for and words are not enough.
- Thank you for being there to pick me up, just when I needed it.
- Thank you for being that friend who I can call and vent to when I need a listening ear.
- Thank you for being my confidant. You never judged me and is the only person I’m not afraid to show how weak I am.
- Thank you for being that person I can come to when I really need advice and know that I will get an honest opinion.
- Thank you for inspiring me. You’re strong, independent, caring, selfless and you inspire me to become a better person.
- Thank you for being that someone who after close to 40 years of friendship, I can still call my best friend and know that nothing will ever change that
- Thank you for being you. Just so you know, you’re one of the few people I truly look up to. You’re amazing ❤
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