To Be or Not To Be

                                     

Preread: 

"The biggest thing in a relationship (every relationship) is Trust & Honesty ... And if that is lost everything is lost"

I spent 7 years of my life in the hostel of Sainik school. The years where you become yourself, where you build your character. 

School gave us all choices in terms of friends and as the saying goes, birds of the same feather flock together. So even in a class of 30 or a batch of 100, you find those selected 5-6 people that have some levels of similarities in traits, mannerisms, wavelength and vibe.

When I left school, I carried my select friends forward (may be not physically, but they were always in thoughts)

Then I went to college and met another set of individuals. Same pattern repeats. You select the birds you can flock together with. There has to be some level of matching wavelength and vibe.

As life carries on, it took me to places... UK, Dubai and now Hong Kong.

One thing I noticed is, as we grow older, the choice of these birds of the same feather become fewer. We also, tend to be careful and restricted in our choices. And in an international environment, The birds could be from different countries and nationalities, but with similar kind of feather. 

In HK, I found another very tight group of 4-5 people, that I call Close Friends.

People I can go to .... when I am low, people I can bitch about things, people who I could open up to yet never feel vulnerable. People who are the straight opposite of this dialogue from various movies ... "Anything that you say could be used against you..."

With them I could say anything and knew, it won't be used against me. 

Let's give names to my friends A, B, C, D and E. (I would have used Alpha Beta Gamma... But then they are not that scientific, to be honest)

A strange combination of people from different nationalities and age groups too. Probably a first time for me too, to have such a varied age group. Me being the older one and yet, sometimes the most emotionally cranky one. (Crankiness is like whisky,  matures with age)

Also an even mix of men and women in the other 4 (no one gives me a lecture about equal opportunity friendship... I am pretty good at it)

A simple group that doesn't necessarily hang out in the weekends or share lunch all the time, but when you are with them... You feel warm, heard and happy.

We jointly bitch and gossip about topics, people, bosses and assholes around.

Everyone does that and should do that.

Why am I explaining it so much? Because that group is .... what I call my lifeline. There are things that you tell your husband or wife and there are also things you talk about, with these birds.

I, personally, am a very accommodative person, but .....there are certain things that are totally against my principles or Core Values.

"Cheating" on ones partner is, for me, a big Zero Tolerance Zone. You may ask, if people do that, how does it matter to me? True, if someone does it, I don't care. It matters to me - only if it is from my friends group. Have we ever discussed the right and wrong sides of this? May be not, but that forms one of the non negotiable feathers of the bird.

If you are single, please go and do it with another single. I will root for you. But if you are married, then loyalty with your spouse is equated to loyalty in our relationship. 

I know that at least B (from my friend group) claims we shouldn't judge anyone by our moral standards. I agree, when it is someone. But when it is my close knit friends group - that's a NO NO. And that is my own rule, that I apply to my relationships.

All in my group are married and some have kids. So if you have committed yourself in a relationship, you need that loyalty. I measure and judge people based on that. Wrong or right, I don't know - I judge.

And then out of nowhere, I get to know (unconfirmed news like all movie star gossips) that A (A for an Alpha) and B (B for a bubbly energetic lady Beta) are having an affair.

Woooh!!!  That hit me like a bolt of lightning. My own friends, who I trust to be loyal are disloyal to their family and kids. 

What do I do? Unconfirmed news, yet with enough pointers in the direction. I have no one in my group that I can confide to. Why? What if this is completely wrong and baseless?  But what ..... if this is true? Where does it leave me....

I am completely screwed up in my brain. My own friends cheating on their partner... Actually No, I felt they were and are cheating on me. On my trust. On my belief system. On my life line.

It has been two days since I heard it, haven't been able to sleep. For the first time, I realized that I could actually lose sleep over such a thing. It has shaken me from within, bringing that cringe feeling.

 When I try to sleep a kind of guilt comes into my heart for their family. A totally abnormal feeling for me. Takes me to all the undiscussed "Moral values" I use, to measure people and most of all my friends.

Friends are meant to correct you when you make a mistake, or even before it happens. And I failed to do that. 

Friends are those who also share honest relationship and they failed to do that. 

I call them as My friends, so My rules apply. 

All this might be a rumour ( I believe in God and have been praying to God.... Hoping that it is actually just a rumour) 

But if it is not. 

I lose two awesome birds from my small little flock. I don't know how, but I hope they find solace somewhere.

They say, "It is better to have an enemy that slaps you from the front, than to have a friend who stabs you from the back"

But did they actually stab me from the back? 

Isn't that a bit harsh on my side to feel that way and put that burden and blame on people who always been there for me....

May be my RIGHT is not the same as their RIGHT. Do I need to see it that way?

Today I stand here... Like Hamlet, in self doubt. Questioning my own judgement of people. One of those traits I felt I was good at. 

Destroyed completely -- At least for now

With a heavy heart.... I sign off (still not knowing what is my next step)

Post script: 

My bestie always says that "I should treat people the way they treat me, rather than how they live their own life" 

And I always thought that to be sensible advice. But somehow on this occasion, I haven't been able to do justice to that advice.

May be it's the "Mature" crankiness at it's worst and I hope to get over it..... Someday soon. So that I can go back to peacefully sleeping and not be bothered by stuff like this.

Important note: 

I came back to writing things, after 7 long years. 

Because I don't know if I can muster the courage to ask any of them about this or not. This perhaps...... is My way of asking them ..... To be or not to be