A Love Letter

Flashback to late May 2018, the heatwave was in full swing and almost everyone on campus was outside, half naked, sunglasses on, playing or just plain old chilling. As with most Indian students on campus with their “sirf ik hi cheez ki yaad aati hai” mood and also, “ghar ka khaana” mood... My friends and I decided, today was a Daal makhani party kind of day. It was super successful thanks to the my friend Adi’s ready made masala packets, my abundance of whole spices, Akshat’s rice cooking skills(which were somehow always better than mine), Sukriti’s dessert and Rutuja’s presence. Sorry Rutu, but you really didn’t do anything that particular day! xD

After food, Adi launched a tirade of bad jokes that were literally the only tasteless thing we had all evening(all semester). Sukriti’s, very mystical, dessert was also a hit, and Rutu’s help with the chopping and cutting, amongst mild mothering about all of our life choices, was a hit. The veggies were so pristinely cut, my girl, I can assure you, you have a talent.

As usual, we knew our time in the UK would end sometime, and so our sessions of gossip were sacred for us. Akshat made us all a round of coffee, which was mildly surprising because I don’t know why but instinctually, I thought I, or one of us girls, would make it if anyone wanted it. That’s what I’ve always done in my family, and seen done everywhere. That’s when the first thing hit me, we’re friends, truly, and patriarchy, and sexism, didn’t have a place here. It was such a small thing, but it has stuck in my mind ever since. If the girls made the food, the guys did the dishes and vice versa. It was heartwarming, simply so.  

I don’t know if I want my parents to know about this though? Like, it’s such a small, harmless thing but subconsciously I’m worrying oh no they’ll think something is going on… “A guy friend… making you coffee… khud se. Sounds like flirting to me”.

Also, only aadha cup coffee because doodh khatam xD Typical

I know this is not what they’ll think, but I’ve been pressed with these notions of friendship with guys and creating a distance that cannot be crossed because men are pigs, that it feels like my face is pressed up against the glass window of a moving bus when it happens. Just the fact that we’ve been so conditioned to the debauchery of equality that simple acts of care and decency cause a stagger in our steps, when that conditioned sexism doesn’t occur.

After exceeding our allotted-time gossip, we get ready to head back home and unfortunately, my flat was, the farthest, on the South end of the campus, a 10-15 minute walk away. There were days when all of them had to come with me to drop me off because it was laaate and we had been talking about ghost stories, I don’t know why we did that but it was fun. Since I had to walk the most, and it had gotten pretty cold for a hot day like the one we’d had, Akshat offered and then went and got me his jacket.

Now, just process from ‘DDLJ’ to ‘That 70s Show’ everything I had been shown said oooh the girl’s cold, here comes the guys’ jacket, ye toh Matlab uff uff romance in the airrrr. It shocked me because unconsciously the only thing I had had in my mind was that guys were decent human beings only when they liked a girl... And that is true too, because that is conditioned in both guys and girls. But I have had good luck with the people in my life among some back luck too.

Right then and there I took a five-ten second pause because it was a kind thing to do, with or without the romance. That friends(guys and gals) could care about each other that way? I’d like to repeat that my girlfriends would do this shit for me in the blink of an eye, but I’d not had a good, hearty and just nice friendship with a guy who would care about me. Honestly, I had not met any decent guys before Lancaster anyway. Yup, you read that right. But the simple fact that Akshat thought of me in the situation as a person who would feel cold, before considering anything else? It’s something I think about, to this day. Also, Adi would’ve done the same, in case you were wondering, but this human being literally had nothing extra?! He was the only one who did not go through emotional life changing dilemma and crises when we had to vacate our flats. Everyone else did, literally every effing one of us. The tauba-s we did when it came to luggage and travelling has changed our lives, for better.

Adi made Anda biriyani for Rutuja, Akshat and I because we were vegetarians. How this man made us rasguallas from scratch!! I repeat!! Rasgullas! No matter the tastelessness of the jokes, Adi was an angelic chef. Anytime nobody wanted to make food? We could always depend on Adi to whip something for us like the Head Chef he was. What I mean is that he contributed to our friendship in his own unique, wonderfully Adi ways. Just like Rutu and I always synced up on breakdowns and kept it to ourselves until we couldn’t any longer. How Sukriti and I related to each other on a spiritual level, although I don’t think I can ever match her aesthetic of sarcasm and how she wraps it up like it present when it gives it to you… Only for you to realise it has been anything but a present. But the girls, I knew about. It was the guys that changed my perspective as I developed respect for them, as human beings.

We loved each other into a new, better life.

I love my friends, and I tell them that, because jeene k literally hain chaar din, why take a chance? Honestly, the only Salman Khan related reference you will ever get out of me.

But why does my love have to be more or less significant when I’m saying it to my guy friends instead of my girl friends? Why is there a need for clarification? Why is there jealousy? Or the desperate need of explanation that I have to scamper around to produce at the last minute because I’m made to feel insecure in my definition of love and how it works with them?

I love people as they are, what body or societal orientation they were born into is not my concern. It’s theirs and God’s. So why label and limit? Feelings or people?

When I moved to Lancaster, I made some unforgettable memories, and I was so damn lucky to have been born in a family that could help me receive these opportunities. But the most important thing I learnt was about love. How romantic love, or familial love isn’t all there is to the experience of love.

The problem is that we’re fed the definition of love, friendship and care in specifically   characteristic ways. So when we encounter love, friendships and life in another variant of itself we either walk around it weirdly or stumble awkwardness every step of the way.

The majority of people around you think there are a proper set of definitions that exist for people, like jobs or roles that a purpose can showcase and exercise. But what is simply not taken into account is the variable that makes everyone them. The unique existence of a person, who may check the boxes society wants them to, but honestly never checks those boxes similarly. The uniqueness of our DNA kicks in and we cannot never be the same person. Then why the same boxes? Our existence, our universe defies boxes by existing. It’s that simple of a fact. Then why let love, which is just as complex as the people exercising it, be controlled by a set of definitive factors?

So, here is a reminder for things that friends, male or female, can do for you that sprout from love, not the stereotypical romantic one, just love and care.

Soul mates go beyond the notion of just a partner. Love is so endlessly mirrored in us and our fleeting and simultaneously immovable feelings. So, if we’re agreeing not to let living people being put in boxes, both literally and metaphorically, then why put love in it? When it governs so much of our lives.

So, if you ever catch yourself contemplating about “what is this”, “what is happening”, “does this person like me that way”, know that love exists, like everything else in the universe, in a complex abundant bounty.

I have met many people, some of them have become family today, and the rest got me to this family.

So, this casual essay, in all its faults and glory, is a love letter to my friends.

So, the next time you catch yourself worrying about how or why you're feeling certain things that you are? Remember, be-ing is fun, so just be. Don't think too much and enjoy people and feelings in ways that will always be unique to you and only you!

And, do that fearlessly... As fearlessly you can manage, Dear Reader.

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