While searching for some book through my shelves , i stumbled upon this small familiar diary which was covered with dust and had long been forgotten. This was a special diary. I had carefully bought it some years back from a gift shop across the corner where i lived, after having considered and rejected many. I had counted the number of friends i had, the number of pages each one would write and added a few more pages for photographs and cuttings, and had come up with an approximate figure for the total pages required. I had ended up buying a sissy, dark purple, floridly bordered , nice looking diary, which could have been a perfect gift for a girl, to say the least. Anyways. I had known then that it would stay with me for a long time. For i was, then, truly a sucker when it came to cherishing friends, life and the wonderful times spent with them. I had wanted something through which i could relieve those days, picture those times, and remember my friends.
I dusted it with a cloth and sat down to have a look at it .
The diary had been titled 'A plunge into the turbulent memory lanes.'
On the first page was a paper cutting which read : ' Friends are not born , but made, for a lifetime remembrance.' So much for it ! It was followed by a few meticulously cut pictures and many pages of scribbling . I read them, often pausing in between to recollect where the person was at present , what he had wanted then and what he had gone on to become. There were some who had been lost. I read what i had written many years back. Came across a funny hindi song that had been written idling around with friends.I smiled along. It wasnt nostalgic but exuberating, as though a preplanned jaunt on a pre destined path; just that at every other corner you'd try to forget what was to come next.
Its raining outside , i wonder how it used to rain a few years back.
(The credit for this pic goes to sameer.It was assembled from the first and the only reunion trip we had. Good times ! Great friends ! )
