“This is the funny thing about
growing up. For years and years, everybody's desperately afraid to be
different, you know, in any way. And then, suddenly, almost overnight,
everybody wants to be different, and that is where we win.”-Mitchell Pritchett ( Modern Family Season 1
Episode 18)
I like escaping people. I have
been told time and again that I am blunt. I don’t know any other way of being.
I can’t smile and be all pink and cotton candy-ish.
I have re–lived most my school
horrors on this blog. This should give everyone a fair idea as to why I am not
keen on staying in touch with my classmates. Thanks to Whatsapp though, one
person who had my phone number added me in our Xth Standard Group. Thanks to
said person every person I was avoiding has my phone-number. You’d think over a
decade later people would at least “Grow Out” of their cliques. Nah! That is
expecting too much. I am okay with the cliques. I think I got so used to it
that their existence just didn’t matter any more. The only solace I find in
growing up is that as I grow older I am more secure about the kind of person I
am growing up to be. I am comfortable in my own skin and yes, I have an opinion
and if you bother me I will deal with you in a fashion that you wish you never
encounter again.
I find that most of my classmates
have since school stopped developing as people. They still tend to bank on
their over a decade old “cool” quotient( Though I completely disagree on them
having EVER been cool).
Do you remember that awful
“Non-Veg” joke that made the round in school, the one about the man who had a
really long dick that, he had to drape it around his neck. Then one fine day he
sees a beautiful naked woman and dies of strangulation?
Well, that sums up the maturity
of the group I am in. Those are still the jokes that make the rounds there. I
hate forwards. I don’t send forwards. I don’t like receiving forwards. If you
are a dear friend and send them to me I will not complain. I will just not read
it. Things were fine until one day when the jokes got a tad bit out of hand. I
just didn’t see the point in staying in the group. Instead of making a fuss and
asking people to behave I decided to exit the group.
Exiting a group is a crime. Did
you know that? Hence I got added right back and my departure was hushed up as a
minor glitch by the administrator. I knew that something would go down soon.
[I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping for a verbal battle.]
One fine evening the Section 370 forward did
its round in group. As a lawyer, I was firstly offended by the very ignorance
of the forward. FIRST OF ALL IT IS NOT SECTION 370 IT IS ARTICLE
370 OF THE INDIAN CONSTITUTION. I mean - come
on man! At least get that right.
The message goes downhill from there. I decided to unleash my inner mata and
then there was silence that prevailed like never before. Phone battery that
dies down in 12 hours lasted 6 hours more that day. All thanks to me. Such
peace. Little did I know that one
tiny outburst would result in the slow death of ANY conversation in the group.
I understand that when people
meet after a decade, it is natural to re-live old stories and laugh about
things of past. For how long? I hate being stuck in a certain phase. Going back
to a phase. Everything has a time. When the time is past, you move on. Move to
newer things.
When people gather together after
a span of time it is natural to go back to things that bound us as a group back
then. That is just initially to break ice. Things have changed. Nobody knows
how much has changed. Hence we tread gently by broaching topics familiar to us
as a group. As we start talking we encroach on other conversational territories
to which we may or may not be able to contribute. You can talk about what has
taken your interest lately. Who knows someone else in the group may share the
same interest. Unless we talk about what is occupying our mind now, how is
anybody who has not been in touch for a long span of time know what to talk about?
The general need to get back in
touch with people is to get to know them better. It shouldn’t come as a
surprise to anyone that the people they once knew have changed. As long as
people are a better and improved version of themselves from 10 years back
nobody will complain. If you are merely a magnified version of your school self
then there is definitely room for worry. If you were a twerp or a moron back
then but have now changed your ways or discovered your brain then I guess you really
have come a long way.
If you were considered weird then
and are considered weirder now, go right back up to the top of this post :)
Peace.
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