Sometimes you hear about allegedly awesome & fun people from mutual acquaintances, all of whom have wonderful tales of third party's superlativeness, & awesomeness.
And you are all geared and tingled up to meet them and add them to your collection of awesome & fun people you know.
When you finally do get to know them, it's a 'uhmm..ah' moment.
It's like - uhmm...I wonder when the awesomness is going to begin' and 'ah, what is wrong with all acquaintances that they don't recognise the blandness & unawesomness of aforementioned awesome person'
and the more you hang out with mutual acquaintances and aforementioned awesome person, the more you doubt who you are.
Because you are trying to figure out if you are just a fun snob who has higher fun standards
or if there is something wrong with you for hanging out with a unfun & uninteresting group (which sometimes is because they are the only group around)
And then you pretend that un-fun things are fun, uninteresting things are mindboggling superb and that is just plain tiring!
The whole show speaks of disparity & un-meeting of minds
When you are younger you have a choice, and don't have to be monogamous.
But as I am getting older, I find that I fake smile a lot more and fake laugh at jokes I would have given sarcastic rejoinders to. The most I can manage these days is a slight arch of the eyebrows when I hear insipid nonsense.
Like when random aunty at engagement party, on hearing I was Malayalee, said:
Oh Malayalees - they are sooo clean. Really, they are just spick and span and just unbelievably clean.
I did the slight raising of eyebrows at her silly generalization.
I did not do what I would have done before:
'That's funny, for we Malayalees think that all Rajasthanis are just incredibly colorful and dance so well.'
(that's weak but you get the drift)
Being with the wrong crowd, even if it is virtually, makes you lose a sense of yourself.
And then God gives you a reprieve by sending you back your long lost best friends.
And they make those sarcastic remarks, and say something so explosively funny that your stomach hurt - a - lot and it's like a lovely tennis match where the balls are never dropped and realization comes about that you were never lost, just hiding you, because unfun group would just not get your brilliance & for fear that somebody innocuous could get seriously burnt by your fierceness.
Because you need someone of equal or greater strength to return that ball.
Which is why, I want to take a moment to say M.L, A.D.K, T.T.K, R.P, C.J, R.J, E.S.A, S.T & sometimes even S.J - i think it would devastate me more than I can admit, if I lose touch with you all again.
Because you guys are this elite group of superlative and incredibly and truly funny peeps, who remind me of where I came from and with whom I can be fiercer & funnier with.
