Best Friends *Forever (*depends)

Born in the 1980s, I have seen best of many different cultural changes. One interesting aspect that I feel has been changing silently is ‘FRIENDSHIP’.

During the 80s, I was used to seeing, friends & best friends. You had the same set of friends at school, tuition, cricket match, homework, birthday party, etc. In fact, there used to be this thing ‘tu apne group ka hai, unke saath mat ghum (you are a part of this group, don’t hang out with others)’.

Slowly came the 90s and with Indian economy opening up, many minds, pockets & attitudes also started to change. Well, friends were still friends, but one started having Tuition friends, School friends, friends with the best gadgets, video games, it became paramount how one shows his/her friendship with innumerable Archie's & Hallmark cards or cups or teddys…

Then something happened once the Millennium kicked in. The internet chat cafes took the momentum of friendships to a new level. The 3310s, 3330s, 6600s of Nokia had penetrated the lives of the young minds, with late night SMSes, MMSes. And as if this was just the tip of the iceberg the mid era of the millennia bought ORKUT to the fingertips… Friendship had now started to grow in the virtual & digital space. The Six degrees of separation theory was finally taking a concrete shape, but the test of friendship slowly started to be determined by the number of scraps, testimonials & friends in the list.

Things started to speed up & bought the new mega machine of making friends & connecting with them called Facebook. Stories of new friendships, new connections, puppy love, naughty love & all sorts of groups popped up. The gifts that friends exchanged earlier got replaced by watermelons, cows & strawberries on the farm. Facebook started to be like the hoarding where people began to display their lives, to get much-craved attention, to feel like a celebrity, to show off to their friends & wanting more. Friendship now was seen with people who react to things in my life when I put it out to display. A nice picture once uploaded if did not get likes & comments from the friends was good enough to create a rift but never show off.

Well, that was sooo 2010, now with half of the decade passing off, friendships are now defined in new ways and manner. Best Friends are now BFFs or BAE (short form of BABE, trust me I am not kidding!!!), friends in need became FWB (friends with benefits) & close friends became FUBUs (fuck buddies). Snapchats, Tinders, Instagram, FBs of the world are taking connecting, expressing, sharing & creating memories at a completely new level.

Now that where my theory begins, with the rapid change in culture & value system we should be ready to the new age of friendship & that is ‘MUTUALISM’ as in social mutualism. Let’s not be judgmental about it, but times are changing, behaviors, patterns & our perspective to feelings are changing. Earlier we just made friends & friendship was all that mattered & moving forward we shall choose them & all that will matter would be how can we both be beneficial to each other. It’s not being mean or selfish but it shall be all about ‘I don’t wanna waste my time & energy’. That brings us to an interesting question, ‘Friendship is pure feeling and friends are the relatives that we make on our own then how come it can come to this?’ well the answer has always been in front of us, the truth is we needed friends & we will need friends but what will change is the ways & reasons. Earlier our reach was limited hence we were contented with a limited group of people we interacted, we were contented with our thoughts & our perspective, this made us explore more in few set of people and that made us know each other a lot more; whereas in last 30 years, the reach is exponential & the amount of exposure to different perspectives, likings, idiosyncrasies have reached beyond borders across the globe. Now we don't invest a lot of time in one person, but we invest time in finding newer ones. Knowing someone just by the surface is more than enough.

To sum up, in few years when you ask the younger lot about who are they hanging out with their answer shall be, “No one, in particular, he/she & I like a MUTUAL genre of music so we just jam.”