REUNION BLUNDER

We all started our journey together when we joined in class I. Same class, same section, same subjects, same teachers but different lives. Zero period, games period and library periods were our favorites. Young, energetic, bright, cheerful, emotional and sharing. Yes sharing was the biggest quality we had then. Shared lunch, stories, pencils, pens, erasers, bench. Enacting stories from the English Reader in its improvised Hindi version with slang. Awesome combination of creativity and friendship. Not even a single occasion which we did not celebrate. Raksha Bandhan to Valentine’s Day- we celebrated all. The idea was to celebrate life. That is all we had learned and that was all we wanted to continue doing for the rest of our lives But pain is an inevitable part of the journey and so is separation. Our school was only till eight standard, so we had to either shift to the nearby Senior Secondary school or some other alternative. Most of us shifted to the Senior Secondary School but those who could not got lost somewhere.

With new school, we got new friends. Old friends from old school got dispersed like seeds. We were in different sections. We tried to stick together but the old union was missing. No, not because of the intention but lack of time may be. New friend list got created – new friends and very few old. Reshuffled again after 10th boards into different streams of Science, Commerce and Humanities. Again the same process of new friend list – many new and few old. Shuffling is a difficult process but always brings new dimension in our lives. New rapport, new emotions and new friends. Separation was painful but no regrets. I don’t wish to change anything from the past.

Getting into a college was a storm, tornado may be. Because this time the whole friend list got deleted and a new one got created – full of strangers who seem to be friendly. They were less natural and more pretentious. Little sharing and more of ego had entered the lives of friends. After college, life became so frustrated that stress has become inseparable from our personalities.

Today after 7 years, we all met again- we school friends. But they are still the same. Unbelievable but true. How did they manage to stay the same? Such sharing, caring and loving people – do they really exist even today. I was so full of tears. It was so unbelievable. They are living the same frustrating life but now when we were together, we were what we were in Class I. When we started our lives together. We had known each others for so long, that it was impossible to deceive by presenting ourselves as someone else. We fairly did it with other people but not with each other.