My Friend: Oceans Apart, but Close to Heart

  •   Sun, Aug 02 2015
  •   By Meghna Hegade

August 2, 2015

Friendship Day is here and I wish you all a very Happy Friendship Day.

But I would like to wish Happy Friendship Day to a special friend who I chat with every single day, sometimes even on Sundays. We are continents apart, and yet we have ways to bug each other. We are not Skype chatting or any other face-to-face sort of chatting and yet we both can clearly see the expression on the face of the other person, that would accompany the message typed out. (Emote icons can be given a little bit of the credit here too!) All in all we are not looking at each other but chatting - day in and day out.


Of Friendships Past...

Anita and I used to sit next to each other in class - in college - every single day for two years (not withstanding, the days and classes we bunked of course - she more than me - but who's counting?) We got caught chatting, whispering, laughing, banging the desk, not listening, (she used to get caught because of me - but like I said - who's keeping score?) And if that was not enough, we would catch up some more after classes and then there were days we would call each other after getting home.

What's more, we even spent an entire one month vacation of our college, working on our college newspaper - in college! We laughed our guts out when we got into weird scrapes while getting everything ready for our college fest or preparing for a symposium or even just the mundane topics that we found to chat about.


Present...

Anita and I still sit beside each other every day in an online sense than a literal sense, and this too has been going on for nearly two years now. We still bunk - I am busy with my children and she is off gallivanting in the US. We still chat and laugh but the real world and our work beckons. There are times all we manage to message each other is 'Hi' - but what truly defines our relationship is that we know the other is right there and will not at any point check their schedule to reach out and help, if required. We talk of our responsibilities, we reminisce our past and we discuss about a lot of things that happen in the world and in our country. We have changed a lot as individuals, but as friends we are the exact same people who used to sit beside each other.


Future...

I don't know what the future holds, or where either of us will be at the time, but what I do know, is Anita will always be beside me. We might have long periods in between when we cannot chat, but I know that time and distance don't matter to us as we will always chat as if we were back to sitting on the bench in our class, in college. We will still be discussing out problems and wishes and much more. And most importantly, my future will be all the better because she is a part of it, wherever either of us may reside.

Why did I choose to talk about something probably many people have experienced and are living right now - because on this day I would dedicated to anyone who has one such friend who has kept in touch despite the years and the oceans between yourselves. That one friend who will always make you smile. That one friend with whom formality is just another word in the dictionary. Go on remember relive the past, treasure the present and be secure in the knowledge that you have your very own pillar of strength no matter what the future will hold. Enjoy because you have true friends not just a number on Facebook.

 

 
By Meghna Hegade
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Comment on this article

  • Ruben Pinto, Australia

    Mon, Aug 03 2015

    Super beautiful.


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Title: My Friend: Oceans Apart, but Close to Heart



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