Meeting up with old friends are great. Until you have to part with them again.. Today was one of those days, meeting up with 6 new friends that I haven’t seen for at least three to 17 months. Shock, would be the word I will use to describe my feelings. Meeting one friend at the bus station was enough of a sucker punch to the emotional equilibrium centre of my brain. When I saw Linds at the station, I couldn’t believe my eyes. There was so much going on in my head, that all I said, was ‘yep, yep yep’ (Like an effing parrot!) I was so flabbergasted, I didn’t even hear what she was saying. All I remember was a hug, and trying to find words to say to her. So, what did I manage to do? I just smiled. So you could imagine, seeing the rest of the crew was just a gong show for my rice-grained cerebral cortex.
Meeting up with everyone was nothing short of a blast. Laughs were had, but its different now. The disconnect with friends was blatantly staring in my face. The inside jokes, popular songs, news, gossip, status on everyone’s lives, are no longer at the tip of my tongue. I cannot just carry on from where we left off (BUT, if you have a few friends whom you can still do that with ease, make sure you make an effort to keep in touch, those are friends are keepers). I often find myself questioning the origin of the inside joke (which…cmon, kills it for everyone). NEVER question an inside joke, or a past event in a group social situation. It is just poor social etiquette.
As the night was closing in, I felt a wave of sadness over me. On the bus ride home, it left me pondering, if this career path is worth this. Is it? If 3 months was hard, what is the next visit going to bring? At what point of playing catch-up with friends will it get old and tiresome? What will be the one constant that will be something to look forward to when I come back? How long is too long for a work term out in the bush? All these questions, made me realize, that face to face interactions with friends is the pinnacle of all human interactions. The notion of just ‘catching up’ with no other ulterior motive is so pure and golden, that it is sometimes deemed as wasting time. Think about it, someone else, is using their time in their lives with you, however brief it is, in which they could be doing something else. Sounds stupid and naive, yet it was the one thing that I took for granted when I was in the city. So to my friends, I thank you for allotting time specifically to catch up with me, and to the random strangers I walk past on the street, I thank you for sharing the sidewalk with me.
(I would post pictures, but they're not mine, and I haven't had the permission of my friends. But they're a good look'in bunch)
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