Friends

Friends. We all have them. They are always with us. They are someone we can always count on to be there when we need them. We often socialize with them. Share secrets with them and in general, have a great time with them. Over the years, you tend to make a lot of Friends. The longer you stay in a place, the more people you get to know, the more friends you have. Then when you change to a new place, you start all over again. You find a new group of people and make a new set of friends.

When I was in 7th form at high school, I had a lot of people that I socialized with. I did go to the same high school for 5 years after all. So I knew a lot of people. Quite a lot of them, I considered as my friends. I would socialize with them all the time. Then school ended. Everybody separated and went their own ways. Just before going, there was this atmosphere at school. Everyone signing everyone else's school shirt and the yearbook. Some of the stuff written in it were things like gonna miss you heaps and keep in touch. Suddenly, a lot of people became your best mates.

But once uni started, its all over. No one knows anyone else anymore. Everyone is busy with their own thing to even bother to talk to you. You take a couple of mates with you. Still bother to keep in touch with these "chosen few". But the rest fade out real quick. Even if you run into them in the street, you have a quick look followed by the raise the eyebrows thing. You acknowledge that they are there and move on and they vanish. Vanish to be seen again another day..... or not.

The more I think about it, the more it seems worthless. But then again, I guess high school is like that. You take about 2500 teenagers and stick them together for a long time in a confined space, you have no choice but to be friendly with them. Its because everybody is always around everybody else. Personal space is out the window. But once you are freed from that space, these formalities or illusions of friendship is no longer necessary. Thats why people tend to fade away real quick. Its because there is no point maintaining an illusion for longer than the necessary period of time. you move on to uni and make a whole new bunch of friends. And the cycle starts all over again.