Life has been so busy that we barely get time to meet often. More ever, our workplace has taken us far apart, he lives in Kolkata ( with an all India transferable job). He comes for few days, but then scheduling a meet is often not possible because he will have too many thins to take care in his few days at home. He has invited me and my family to Kolkata, but that also has not been possible so far. So the only time we get opportunity to meet is in our PG meetups, THAT TOO, once in a year or even sometimes couple of years.
Kolkata is famous for bangles, especially this conch shell white bangles. And if you don't know, then all Hindu married ladies wear a bangle till death ( red is must, and white as add on) as part of our custom and tradition. So she wanted some authentic bangles from Kolkata and my friend did spend some nice time finding the authentic ones ( as Kolkata is also famous for duplicates) after talking to his office staffs who are residents of Kolkata. A couple of these bangles cost him 1200/- INR and on top of that, he brought a lot of red bangles as they were not very expensive ( made of glass). This was brought almost 3 months back and kept at his home and I did not have opportunity to collect them. But then suddenly this news came about his accident at his work place.
Thankfully, his family had just arrived at his workplace to visit Kolkata as he is about to be transferred. But then this sudden twist changed all the plan. A truck coming in the wrong way hit him ( he was on a 2-wheeler), with injury on his leg and hand and a big cut under his mouth resulting 6 stitches. His office staff took him to hospital from the accident spot ( it happened while he was going to office) and it took 3 hours for his wife to reach him ( a typical problem in big cities). Next day she brought him to our place and as soon as we heard the news we decided, we must meet him now.
When we reached at their home, he was in so much pain and distress, but after spending 2-3 hours with us, he was not able to control his laughter and was telling me not to make him laugh so much, as his stitches were hurting. These are the times, when we need friends physically, face to face to overcome the pain. In this busy life, everyone has priorities, but then we must not forget that we have some social life as well. A physical meet with friends can never be compared with a virtual presence ( be it a video call even), at least for our generation, I feel.
Do you feel the same ? When we knocked at his door, he had to take help of his son to walk out of his bed room, but when we left, he came on his own to leave us till the lift. That was the power of friendship in those 2-3 hours.
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