MY friend Meena came to visit with her family, and it was the right cheer I needed from the usual dreariness that comes with consuming news and being online 24/7. Nothing compares to spending time with your best friend or, as the kids call it, my ‘ride or die’.

We had breakfast a few times together, we caught up with our friends and extended family; we discovered new places, revisited old haunts; we attended a qawwali, listening to a new troupe she’d not heard before, and, of course, we ate a lot of barbeque, ma­­ngoes and paan. And her daughters taught me what the kids are saying, doing, uploading, which proves handy when teaching.

We all have those friends with whom we enjoy a special bond. You can go months, maybe years without speaking to them, but then pick up like you’d been in touch forever when you reconnect. Unlike childhood, where friendships are formed around play, as we grow older our priorities change, and sometimes friendships change too, but what we want from them, doesn’t.

A relationship expert in 2020 told The Atlantic magazine that “young adulthood is the golden age for forming friendships”. It is usually our first time as independent adults outside home and school, navigating life. We choose our friends and learn........

© Dawn