The curious case of friendships, dreams and life ..

I am just back from a work trip to the capital city of Pakistan. My work requires a lot of up-country and local travelling which I enjoy very much since I get to see my friends there, meet new people, discover new places and explore a lot of different things on the way. I had to go to Abbottabad and this time we chose the Nathiagali route so as to counter the horrific heat. The whole way I was amazed at the scenic beauty of our country. When I tweeted “Enjoyed nathiagali like anything”, one of my twitter buddies had a question for me ..”How can one enjoy alone?”. I seriously had to think twice before answering this question and this is probably why this blog post originated.

I am the youngest in my family with two elder brothers, so all my childhood their and my interests have been repelling. I remember playing with dolls alone, doing my home work alone and creating a fantasy land of my own where I had a bunch of imaginary friends which I wanted in real life. Therefore, I have always been the kind of person, who would love to socialize. When I entered university, I was lucky enough to be part of a group where everybody was my friend just as the ones I had fantasized. I remember never going to uni for fun,always to meet my friends. I made up stupid plans, sometimes going to an exhibition, sometimes posing for a group photo shoot, sometimes for an eid Milan lunch and when nothing, calling them up at my place for hangout. We were great. My life revolved around my friends. I had a continuous argument with one of my friends to whom I used to say that don’t pamper me this much, else I will miss this time when you wont be around for me. Sometimes I used to be very angry at two of my friends who were committed to each other, not because of anything else but because they would ruin the friends plan by going on a date at the same time. The theory was simple: gf’s/bf’s are ok to spend time with but not at the cost of your friend’s time!

By the time, we were about to finish our studies, some of us started getting engaged/married. This used to be a very special occasion because we thought the friend’s family is growing into a khandaan! Soon after studies, we started off with our jobs. Everybody got a kickass career move mashaAllah. I still was the one who ended up making plans for meeting for a lunch/dinner. This time, the responses started getting varied. “Yaar abhi time nahin hai” ..”Baqion se pooch lo phir mujhey bata dena” ..”Yaar I already have a commitment somewhere else” ….”Zaroor challenge but meri mangaitar nahin ayegi” (Since she is my fiancée so I will date her only but not take her out in public in our mutual friend’s gathering). I started getting restless. Then one fine day we decided to meet up at university. It was a wonderful day to sit at the canteen side on the grass behind Pharmacy canteen eating kachori’s. Almost all the friends made it their that day .. but something just struck me right into the heart. Only after 7 months of separation ..we weren’t the friends that I had imagined. We had an obsolete knowledge of what was going in each other’s lives. There were 5 guys and one girl apart from me in the group. The guys obviously met up every weekend and knew about each other very well. The girl was engaged to one of the guys in the group and so she somehow was better informed about all of them. And here was me .. obviously not informed and just not fitting right into the group. We sat together for a chit chat, but obviously I wasn’t well aware of the codes the guys were using or the events they were referring to which they attended together. I felt shattered!

My life revolved around my friends.. or atleast this was the way I perceived them always. I used to put up facebook albums of our university time together, ask my friends to sign up for facebook. Tag each of their photos when they came on facebook (Yes, currently on an average I must have 200+ photos tagged of my friends on individual basis). I used to write poems, dream about the time of my life I had over the years and thank God for having so nice friends. Even though I accepted that we may meet after long, but sitting there feeling awkward was one of the most hardest feelings I sustained. Out of all these years, I had the right to know if one of them was appearing for an IBA test (Shouldn’t they ask me too?) or if the other one was all set to tie the knot to his beloved in the coming three months or if one of them was leaving for an international official trip ..why I didn’t know?

Another aspect to this was the fact that by this time, almost all my friends were committed/engaged and married except for me. So that means they had a lot to do in their personal lives managing their career, family, friends and in-laws. Agreed. I wasn’t committed/engaged or married then but I bet, even if I was .. this could have never been a reason for ignoring my friends. So the tree of friendship stood there, laughing at me .. because I was alone in this mad,mad world!

This was the last time I went to university. I never go there. Because it hurts! To be at a place where you had the best of your time with the best of your people …and to see that place again, all deserted, with no promises for future.. I never went back to university.

Right after uni, is also the time when you are actually transforming yourself into a practical person, so a lot of things get revealed to you in a certain style. The revelation was pouring itself upon me .. shattering my dreams, molding me into something new & classy.

Sometimes, I used to run across a bunch of happy students ..and get jealous. Sometimes, seeing them I just used to smile. I shut down my facebook account to see how my friends react, and the response was nothing but a final dent in the coffin. I was critically ill in hospital for around a month and with several thousand reasons of worries .. but none of my friends except one had time to come see me!  May be the persons who claim to love you the most, hurt you the most!

Eventually life has turned a new face towards me. There are no more dreams to run for. I travel a lot and tweet a lot. I meet a lot of people and enjoy talking about different stories ..but I am not into friendships anymore. When years of friendship can take a side over preferences and priorities ..then how would you trust the new one’s I ask! This is why, when I travel .. I can enjoy having a burger at Hardees alone, or going to shopping alone. I just get myself rolling.
And yes, I take equal responsibility for not being a good friend too!

Priorities. Hunh!

CEST LA VIE!