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I loved my stationery as a child. I mean, loved. I mean, had a spare backpack stretched to its last inch with all imaginable supplies. And yet, when a certain brown-haired friend from nursery forgot bringing his material for art class, I broke my red crayon into two and offered it to him with my most dazzling smile. Probably my earliest altruistic gesture. Probably my last.
I changed cities about four years after this. I don't remember making a friend in the new place, at least not one worthy enough for the other half of my crayons. Until a new kid took admission in the batch halfway through the year. He covertly scribbled 'I love you' in the back of my almanac, and paraded it around the class making fun of me, the idiot. I remember him waiting back in school with me the day before we closed for summer. He gave me a box of my favourite chocolates, and told me they were moving again. Today we're just LinkedIn connections, having never spoken since.
College is different. You find yourself surrounded by too many people, all ready to talk, but seldom willing to have a conversation. Often, it feels like a black box of four grinding years, laughing and loving and living together; until one day you find yourself at the end of the line, alone.
They say, losing people as time goes by is just a part of growing up. In which case, it's a little sad how we often choose the wrong people early on, ones we don't deem well enough to stick with through the years. And in case we choose exactly the right ones, guided by the innocence of childhood; it's sadder how apathetic we grow up to be, indifferent to the absence of those who helped shape our person.
They say, losing people as time goes by is just a part of growing up. I wonder, how lonely must they be, having to veil their loss as growth to deal with their hollow solitude.