EVOLUTION OF A F.R.I.E.N.D

You know, there are things that you know are important and you treat them thusly, and there are things that you deem pretty unimportant and therefore give them no significant attention... And then there are things that you know are very important for you, for your well-being, for your existence even...and yet at times you tend to treat them as Chunkey Pandey in an award function, ignored to the point of being ridiculous...

The subject of my super long prologue is friends. Friendship is a much hyped concept, where you end up putting in so much thought that if we did half as much in a particular topic, we'd all be Ph.Ds. And yet, after the prelims are over, the first excitement of hanging out together kinda fizzles out, where does your new friend come up on the friendship parameter?? Now that is a question so wickedly uncomfortable that we prefer to reroute it to the Dept. of Blissful Ignorance and leave it at that.

Before any of you starts getting all sniffy and injured, let me clarify... I do not mean that after the first excitement is over, you stop being good friends... It’s kind of like being married I guess. You have a honeymoon period, where lust is the topmost priority that needs to be fulfilled at all times, at all places. So we have one in a new friendship, where you simply can’t do without the intellectual stimulation...at all times, at all places...  

Married people move on next to the smug era, flaunting their new relationship with an obnoxious glow and millions of anecdotes, new discoveries, bonding with the second family et all. So do you quickly move on to the smug friend phase, where you flaunt them in front of your other friends, showing off the newest accessory of your life. Millions of anecdotes, check...bonding with their friends too...check....obnoxious glow...check.... you know you are in that phase when almost every alternate sentence of yours starts with, "you know my friend XYZ..." 

And then there's the third phase where you get more settled into the relationship, get more used to the fact that you are now part of an institution (no, not the asylum, marriage is called an institution too...), and just bring out your special marriage expertise if and when the occasion arises...

And so you get used to your friend, as you and he/she transform from being in a euphoric BFF state to a "hey what’s up, watchu doin, it’s been a while, wanna meet up??" You know, much more comfortable, much more at ease, and much less psychotic... And you never know....if your new friend survives the wear and tear of time....then well he/she gets to be one of the lucky dudes who gets to know of your marriage or your super cool new job or your first kid, personally and not via...well Facebook!!!