I met her mother in school in the 7th standard and we were “best friends” from day one. I spent many Sundays going over to her place or she would come over to mine and the three years that we were classmates, we were inseparable. We stayed in touch for nearly seven years after 1983 but then lost touch for some time. In that time we both got married and she had her daughter. Then I traced her in Pune, found her address, wrote to her, but our letters crossed when we moved to Delhi. Then in 2002 on her birthday I decided to give her a surprise, spoke to aunty and my premonition came true, that she was in Delhi. I went to the school where she was teaching and surprised her … Geetu and I picked up our friendship from where we left it. Nothing much had changed for us, we just included Krishnan, Harish, and Gayatri. Well, in an interesting coincidence I met Gayatri when she was in the seventh standard…. The same class in which I had met her mother :):):).
Two days back Gayatri invited me to connect over Linkedin and in a way proved that life moves around in cycles, one completes the other. It was a very special invite for me, because it closed the loop on a friendship that is 34 years old … Nearly a lifetime. It was also special because now Gayatri is in the corporate world and I can play mentor. It is a privilege to watch her grow and become a professional and to see her learn all the things that I once learnt as a young professional.
There are such special memories of my friendship with Geetu, the many secrets that we held for each other and still do, those lunches that we saved from Javed and ate behind that particular bush, advise that we gave each other, Geetu’s calm and my non-calm, she has all the poise for both of us and I have enough unpredictability for both of us.
Geetu, Javed, Sriman, Ranjeet, Adeeti, Seema, Nishi, Enakshi and Anu – you all make friendships special. Nishi, I now will await the next special Linkedin invite from Jyoti as she gets into the corporate world next. … The next generation is here, make way and let’s watch them soar high. :):)