We really grew up, didn’t we? It’s been years but my shoulder still remains soaked by your tears, which were once because you scratched your knee and fell while we ran astray on the basketball court. But today it’s because of how overwhelming being away from home is. You used to throw a fuss to copy my homework, now we sit on study calls explaining concepts to each other. A lot has changed – homework turned into assignments, Snapchat streaks morphed into LinkedIn connections and playing catch turned into partying.
But, the one constant has been the comfort of company, others growing as I grow. They’ve shared my childish fear of darkness and they’ve shared my fear of graduating high school. They’ve also shared the excitement of becoming teenagers and the reality of becoming adults. There’s always someone that will understand what I mean when I say, “remember when…?”.
Remember when birthday parties were pav bhaji, cake and chips on those paper plates that can barely hold the weight of the food. When everyone wore the party hats, smiled in pictures, played tag, and of course the highlight of the party – getting return gifts at the end. Somehow that turned into dressing cute, pouting and throwing gang signs in pictures and tables filled with bottles (not return gifts unfortunately). But, is it really that different? It’s a party, there’s food, there’s fun, there’s friends.
Remember when you would talk about that cute boy in class and that pretty girl in your neighbourhood? The “Oh my god he looked at me today!” and “our hands accidentally touched when we walked past each other” has somehow morphed into “She said she loves me” and “I think he’s my person”. But, is it really that different? I still sit with my girls freaking out over a text from that one person. The group chat still floods with screenshots of cute things they say and I still have to hear my friends call me a simp every time I blush.
Remember when summer was all about swimming in the pool for hours, eating ice cream, staying at friends’ houses. Now it’s all about planning trips, applying for internships and partying on a beach. But, is it really that different? There’s still water to dive into, ice cream remains a timeless summer essential and sleepovers turned into 2 nights, 3 days packages. Oh wait, the internship. I suppose it is a bit different, it’s more real now. The nights don’t feel endless, sometimes your friends are far away doing their own thing, and you are sitting and planning out how to make the most of time away from assignments.
Somehow, we grew up, we moved on from crushes to falling in love, from being reckless to worrying about money, from being kids to being adults. It is different, so different.
But nothing is disappearing, it’s merely growing up with us, the company remains constant. We were once just side characters who you needed mom’s permission to meet but now, you are a part of my reality. We don’t just celebrate birthdays, we celebrate little wins like “no contact for a week” or getting a position in a university club. We don’t just meet for an hour in the day, we sit next to each other no matter the time if we need a friend. So, it is really that different, and that’s okay. We’ve traded our evening playtime for creating core memories, our fictional stories for deeper connections, the dreaming for doing, and meeting for staying.