The Changed

When i think back to when we first started hanging out, I doubt it ever occurred to me that we would ever reach this point. I knew even back then that things and people both change like the weather. And I knew that both of us would change a lot over the next few years. We were so young back then; we'd only just begun to understand the world. How mature can two 15 year olds be? But what I didn't know or ever expect was this huge a change. To say I never saw it coming would be an understatement. That can be said only if you ever even imagined something like that happening in the far future. Me? I never even considered it. The thought of it was unimaginable.

Yes, people change all the time. Hairstyles change, dressing sense changes. Likes change, dislikes change. Perspectives change, careers change. Moods change, temperaments change. But the person and their personality remains the same. Even psychology says that the basic personality of a person remains the same throughout their life. Yes, you may keep yourself open to discovering new things about a person and changing your perception of that person, but you won't stop judging them on what they sad or do. Even if you're adding new pieces of information to what your perception of that I person is, your initial judgement always stays and overshadows whatever else you think of them. Therefore the phrase 'first impression in last impression'.

When the Tsunami hit the coast in 2004 it completely changed the landscape. When I had visited Kanyakumari as a little girl, I took a lot of happy memories back home with me. But when I went back there 3 years back, the place was completely changed. Even though it had been 5 years and the Tsunami had long since come and gone, it had completely transformed the place. The ruins near the beach where I had made my sandcastles so they won't get destroyed by the waves were gone. Vanished into thin air. There was no sign that the broken down cottage had ever existed.

I guess, what I'm trying to say, however inarticulately, is that the only explanation i can think for this change in you is something as drastic as the 2004 Tsunami. And proof of that, is the fact that i have no idea whatsoever of what really happened to you.

People don't change this much, at least not usually. Only in the rarest of the rarest situation. People don’t change from outgoing and frank to introvert and rude suddenly. Empathy doesn't turn into apathy just like that. They don’t cheat on their girlfriend and then try to win them over again by lying about having a terminal disease. They don’t incessantly message you and then suddenly yell at you to stop bothering them by messaging them so much. Heart to heart midnight chats don't turn into threats that start from having you raped and end with you getting murdered.

Then why did this happen to you? When did you stop being my best friend and became this heartless monster who's now yelling at me on the other end of the phone call? When did you stop messaging me to wish me luck before an important exam and instead started messaging me on my bad days to tell me how happy you were that I was miserable? When did the encouraging speeches turn into disheartening announcements of all those other unpleasant things you had planned for me? When did you change from being the subject of my happy and contented dreams to the object of my very worst nightmares?

And then - WHAM!

It hit me so suddenly that it left me staggering and gasping for breath. Is that how realisations usually happen? With the uprooting jerk and shattering of mental barriers that had, until now, kept it all from registering into my brain? Maybe yes, maybe not. But that's how it happened to me.

The realisation came. It didn't matter that people don't change this abruptly. It didn't matter that I didn't know what the drastic thing to happen to you was. And it didn't matter when it happened. I was just wasting my time thinking about all of this. Because what mattered was completely different.

What mattered was the fact that you DID change, no matter how abruptly. What mattered was that something drastic DID happen, but the fact that i don't know what it was only proves how ridiculous I am for letting it affect me so. What mattered was not when it happened, but the reality of it simply happening. And all these things can only mean one thing. And that thing was that I had to let you and that image of perfection about you that i had in my head go away. I had to accept the fact you weren't my best friend anymore, you weren't my confidant anymore, you weren't my motivation anymore. You were a piece of my past.

And with this realisation, came acceptance. Acceptance of all this, and acceptance of the fact that I WILL let you go.

Acceptance has come to me in all its might and glory.