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| Edited By: Priyanka Chaturvedi |Source: DNA |Updated: Sep 17, 2016, 12:10 AM IST
I am not a big fan of school/ college reunions. I always wondered what drove people to organise these events only to catch up and meet with people you never cared for during your student years. And honestly, if you cared enough, you’d make the effort to stay in touch. I know it’s a very cut-and-dried approach, but there have been moments when I did attend these get-togethers and felt totally out of place. So to save the host from any awkwardness, I didn’t attend any.
Imagine the school crush you once thought was the handsomest ever has turned the paunchiest ever, in just a decade. Not that I am a Miss India either, but still! People you were close to at some point, turned out to be totally not what you had imagined them to be someday. Also, to be honest, I am sure many people I knew back then, could also feel the same about me when they meet me today.
Returning to the point I was making, here’s why I stay away from reunion plans, without coming off snooty. However, that definitely doesn’t stop me from befriending them on Facebook and taking a peek into their lives and feeling happy for them. At least, social media has made small talk possible through their platforms less awkward as opposed to running out of what to talk after the initial euphoria of meeting them, has died down. For me, it is the best way to be in touch, yet be disconnected.
Of course, there are memories — most of them of good days, friendly banter, gossip and more. Some, not so pleasant — of being painfully thin and laughed at to being awkwardly tall to be mocked at. I recently bumped into a school friend who didn’t fail to remind me of how much they used to joke about it.
Apparently, the ‘body shaming is uncool’ memo hasn’t reached a few yet. So I gave her quick gyaan session. I am sure she regrets meeting me accidentally just as much as I loved sharing some knowledge on body shaming with her. But then, never mind, we are like this only!
The Wonder Years was a TV show I absolutely loved and only Kevin Arnold could always get it right, when he said, “Some people pass through your life and you never think about them again. Some you think about and wonder what ever happened to them. Some you wonder if they ever wonder what happened to you. And then there are some you wish you never had to think about again. But you do.”
So... all these people have made me whatever I am today, I am grateful. Letting go of one’s past is never easy. Some do it for nostalgia, some to relive the past moments. The past is a good teacher if you are a student of life.
