"Bringing Up Kids Is Challenging"

Soni Razdaan On The Challenges of Bringing-up Alia Bhatt & Shaheen Bhatt

@nishjamvwal

“Bringing up kids in today's world is challenging full stop  period !!!” says actor Soni Razdaan with her typical jest intertwined with  serious undertone, about her girls Shaheen and the new kid on the Bollywood  block -Alia Bhatt.

A mother daughter relationship to me has always been intriguing, mainly because of the complexities of my own relationship with a tiger mom. I do believe she’ll agree with Soni wholeheartedly. There is some curiosity within me about Soni, an opinionated woman, bringing up two attractive girls, the tough times, frustrations she faced as a mother and how she circumvented these.... 

“I think I am blessed really. I have two such special daughters. Shaheen, the elder one is balanced, sensitive and astute. Alia , an obedient and serene child who floated through her childhood on a little pink cloud,  mostly did what ever she was told, unlike Shaheen, who had a mind of her own from the age of two and argued about everything. I remember her telling me at eight-'Its my life, don't tell me what to do !' I was trying to get her to eat her vegetables. As a mother, suddenly having to deal with teen age moods is rather unnerving and both had their share of those.... “

As soon as Alia turned fifteen, she climbed off her cloud and turned into a normal, rather moody teenager, which was a shock to Soni Razdaan. “ Where did that come from ? Why is my happy go lucky child weeping behind a locked door! Then Shaheen, who had by now become wise beyond her years, patiently explained to me that all this was perfectly normal, and to just leave her alone !  She reminded me of all the years I had spent banging on her door, asking if she was ok. 'She will figure it out mom,' she said. ‘Let her be.’ “

  And then all of a sudden, life for Alia changed forever,  much to Soni’s bewilderment-  “She has had to grow up fast in the last two years, sometimes I do feel a pang for the pressure on someone so young. It's tough sans those happy go lucky college years.  I’m concerned that she should keep her head on her shoulders and stay balanced through all this sudden attention. It's not normal and can be very dizzying for an eighteen year old to handle.”

In terms of do's and don't's , controlling girls and shaping their value systems is a tough one for a mother most often “I always believed that it was more important to be a friend to my daughters.” Having said that, kids do need boundaries. How does one manage both “One thing I never gave them grief over was academics. I believe that if you are going to be an academic achiever, it's already there within you. 

My mother never pushed me, I just had the bug in me to work hard in school and so I did. I pushed gently now and then when I felt they were not focusing  but mostly I told them if you don't work, you won't reap rewards, and you may suffer the consequences. So they learnt to be responsible for themselves that way.  They didn’t have mom to fall back on to do their projects or grill them before exams.  Of course I took up their work and helped them a lot, but very soon, they learned to do all that themselves.  To the point where, when it came to the boards and I kept asking them if they needed my help, they shooed me away !  “

Suddenly when she made her entry into Bollywood, Alia had to scramble around and lose weight in three months flat, go on a strict diet regime, all while doing a stressful International Baccalaureate course. “Phew, that she managed it all convinced me she that she’s become a strong girl! “

  

“I have  always more concerned for their safety, than any kind of pseudo moral issues. I think one way I coped is by not having an ostrich mentality. I know many parents just think, - my child would not do this or that. Don't you believe it ! So I bring everything out in the open and we talk about it openly and naturally. Boyfriends, drugs, alcoholism, money, values, decency-I encouraged them to tell me the truth. I see my contribution in their lives more in terms of making them aware of the problems they can get into before they get into them (hopefully).  I think its worked very well so far."

I can say that probably the hardest thing a mother has to do is to let go. I know I haven't yet, and I probably never will.  Whatever my kids may say, I can sense that they still need me around to lean on, when the going gets rough. 

They need my husband Mahesh Bhatt's brilliant sage like advice now and then to give them perspective.  The trick is to be there and not be there both at the same time.  Don’t ask me how one does that.  As parents, we are still learning.  Isn't that what it's all about ?

Written for & published by Asian Age & Deccan Chronicle

@nishjamvwal
http://nishajamvwal.blogspot.com/

Choosing Your Friends Smartly- Salman Khan & Govinda are not rare examples & Friendship is not extinct!

Friends are God's way of apologizing to us for our families Tennessee Williams @nishjamvwal

    

A disappointed crony confided in me about her disillusionment with her close friend. “I hadn't allowed myself to see the flaws, assuming that they’ll go away or I convinced myself that they didn't exist. So what does one look for in a good, abiding friend Nisha ? she asked , not wanting to make the same mistake again. "One that doesn’t become a liability, but is a source of succour and joy?” she said. That set me thinking.

To me, living in the world of Luxury, the media and the Glamour set I must admit that I have often felt like the victim of agenda. I feel like a great target for upwardly mobile wannabe’s with agendas as well as publicity hungry sharks. I realized some time ago that I must be forever careful and prefer to fly solo than be patsy to the steady flow of social climbers in ambitious times. 

So yes, I will share some golden principles of how to choose good friends, and yes they have worked for me. As I sit by the window with a close friend, laughing about very inane things, sharing holiday vignettes, I have to say yes, I've known some fabulous friendships over the years. I must admit I used to find male friends more uncomplicated and straight up, but now , must be a sign of maturity, I've even got great , enriching female friends!!!

•  The first rule is- no friends with agenda’s for me. Always put up your antennae and try to glean right at the start when you still have your objectivity intact, when a friend may have some hidden motive for your friendship. It is always more rewarding to have friends who fulfill you with conversation, company and a few laughs than someone being nice to extract something out of you or use you to meet other people you are connected with.

• That automatically means that I also try to avoid friends from a similar line of work where there would be a conflict of interest.               

Two Bollywood actors  who started out as great friends and starred in many films together - Priety Zinta and Rani Mukherji- today post a fall out have an undeclared war of sorts. Their relationship turned sour in the process of perusing the same career goals in the world of Indian cinema, and this was also noticed by Karan Johar who used them together in ‘Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna’ channelizing their emotions effectively.  

Director Satish Kaushik and Pankaj Kapur were good friends and co-anchors on a TV show where they kept the audience in splits with their unique brand of humour. But illustrating my trepidations of too close a friendship in the work place, they fell out.

Govinda and Salman Khan, Karan Johar and Shah Rukh are exceptions, they work together, have a great bond, and actually benefit each other by being close friends, enjoying the work experience together, travel together and if they have spats, they iron them out with a healthy pow-wow and move on. A pow-wow is after all a natural occurrence in any close bond.

• Often a regard for similar values makes for a good friendship. This way you don't end up judging each other, because you are on the same page to start with. 

• Although having expectations is not conducive to the best in friendships, there does need to be the feeling of  support, as the saying goes, a friend in need. You do want to know that its not all about the laughs and good times, that you have some one to go to when the world looks like its crashing around you. And which of us don't have that feeling some time or other.

• Shared moments  of laughter are special, so for me, it works to have a friend with a sense of humor, a person I can laugh with and where I can be me. 

• I gravitate toward friends with that non-judgmental acceptance of me for the great feeling of comfort this factor provides. A kind of happy bonhomie where you're left to be whom you are and even loved for it. 

Nisha JamVwal 

• Since cheerful company is always preferable, and it is a no-brainer that you must avoid negative persons, try to avoid the self appointed role of agony aunt. If a friend needs you, of course be there, provide a shoulder or a kerchief for the occasional tear. And on your part, try not to choose to be a one-man NGO  looking to alleviate man's lot.

Friendships, like all relationships, need to be nurtured. Often people get married, and in the absorbing newness of the experience, let the stars of friendship grow distant in the matrimonial earth-moon orbit. But this often results in over dependence -with this foresight one understands and values the enrichment that  friends  bring to a fuller life. 

Tread gingerly, evaluate carefully, take your time about becoming intimate, and yes, you can reap the rewards of an enriching friendship that lasts a lifetime. Dive in hurriedly, and it may not always be a smooth ride , and worst of all may end with a resounding thud! 

written for & published by Asian Age & Deccan Chronicle 
@nishjamvwal
http://nishajamvwal.blogspot.com/

Love Affair Gone Sour? Heal & Move On Ranbir Kapoor Style!

 Forgetting The Past & Moving On

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You wake up and you bbm your lover. The last thought you sleep with is that intimate moment you just shared. And then boom, least expected, it’s all gone up in the air and you’ve split up, no longer dating or married or together. It’s ended. It’s bitter. You hate each other more than anyone else in your life. That same person, whom you prayed for, wished for, ate from the same plate with you now feel such a strong revulsion toward. And yet you cannot move on? You’re mentally clinging on. -Hate is another form of love, isn’t it? So how then should you forget the past and move on, close the door on the bitterness and let in the healing breezes of a new love affair? You cannot can you? With the past clinging on?

Nisha JamVwal 

There is no going back and yet every pore and muscle wants it all back, without the betrayal and complications. Well, unfortunately, there is NO GOING BACK. There is only one way, to go forward, towards a new beginning, a new future.

Just yesterday all your loyalties were with that special one. You loved cared and were devoted. And this feeling of disorientation is unbearable. It just makes you feel marooned and isolated from your very core. Your reason for being has been snatched from beneath your feet. You feel most shocked and have this big sense of betrayal. Both of you.

The sad truth is that there is no real formula except working hard at moving on. Yes, the same adage works here too! There is really no free lunch, it’s a self training exercise of determination all the way. Travel. Does it work? I know, every prospective partner you meet on the trip, you’re comparing to that one who just exited. So heres the thing, why on earth are you looking anyway? I mean, didn't you just get out of a tough relationship?

   

The trick I’d say, is to not look, not covet, not secretly want a tailor made clone of the past partner to come and fill the lacuna. Let more fun and exciting, mind occupying entertainment fill the lacuna. Learn a new language, loose the unwanted weight, call up your friends who've been tolerant of you taking them for granted. Sort out your email inbox and make folders. Occupations that do not bring you back to the same old ‘why’, ‘how’, ‘when’ questioning, rehashing, self doubt routine are an exercise in will power that will get you through. Trust me it’s not worth it if its over. It is time to move on and away from all the self recrimination, hurt and pain. It’s time to make new occupation and focuses of your time.

It might not be easy but if you don't close the door on the past the future will never unfurl and flower. Here I’m not saying it will be another partner, but I’m definitely promising that you’ll be happy again, realize why it didn't work, feel a sense of relief that nature and serendipity took you away from something that was not meant for you. Because something happier is waiting for you at the curb just ahead.

How do I know? Because I've been through it, I chose to end a relationship that had become a liability, and yes I've cried and felt it’s the end of the world, but I have delighted some painful chunk of time later in the relief of being rid of an anchor that weighed me down and never let me soar. Because remember one important thing, and yes I know what I’m speaking of, true love makes you soar and delight with every waking moment. And it takes you to new growth and positive metamorphosis with every brush. I've always viewed love as a timeless ethereal fragrance that lingers, warms , gives meaning to moments and stays with me forever.

Not a long time ago the much publicized romance between Deepika Padukone and Ranbir Kapoor broke up. Even the audiences who enjoyed seeing the good looking couple together were disappointed, let alone the deep pain Deepika so obviously went through. But each found new love and happiness, not Bollywood style, but in the real world sense. So love does have its expiry period too sometimes, and some of us lucky ones find the forever love- its very much a matter of chance, investment of self, time and then it is luck.

Love, I believe, shouldn't pull you down and fall apart eventually. The very fact that it came crumbling down is because it was never meant to be in the first place, so move on and find meaning in other pursuits, and yes , out of the blue true love will might come and blow you with its magic when you least expect it to.

Written for Printed & Published in Asian Age & Deccan Chronicle 

Nisha JamVwal nishajamvwal@gmail.com

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Life, Trauma, Questions & Alexander McQueen

"The Good life is not a place you arrive at. It is a lens you bring to the place you are at right now"

Just yesterday I wore an Alexander McQueen backless dress and felt beautiful in what was a most ingeniously created work of art. In its construction and conception. Must take a beautiful mind to have conjured this I wondered, and then my mind began to ask what made this acclaimed creative genius said to be worth twenty million pounds, commit suicide at 45 at his stunning  two million pound flat in Mayfair, central London? He was doing work he liked, achieved recognition, success, money, fame, adulation and was one of the greatest creative geniuses of our times. Not enough reason to endure living? Are there further barriers to the elusive state called happiness? 

One hint perhaps, was, critics opined, an obsession with the 'Afterlife' that came across in his work. Did he see the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, on the other side from life? Perhaps!

The ostensible reason was that the fashion designer – high on cocaine- slashed his wrists with a ceremonial dagger on the eve of mum Joyce's funeral was the grief of her parting. But we loose people through life. Life is a series of loss, from the day we are born. So then what is the way out to grapple with pain, loss and suffering? I’d say the  only way out is within. What comes to mind is a famous quote about happiness –‘chasing happiness is like chasing a butterfly in a garden. 

Try to capture it and it evades you. Sit on a bench and close your eyes - it will come and rest on your shoulder’.

McQueens psychiatrist  shared with the inquest that he felt constantly let down by people. By friends whom he had felt exploited him, that they had taken advantage of his fame and he had felt "let down" by some long-term relationships. And then he was shattered by the loss of that one person whom he trusted, his mother. And this only highlights the same point, that the very elusive happiness does not come from relationships. Nor even from material triumphs. 

One cannot be obsessive about money, house, friends and faithfulness from those friends, because these wants and expectations prevent peace. 

One can only do what comes one's way and try to be serenely absorbed in that. Remember Fountainhead’s Howard Roark? His greatest joy was the journey, his creation, his obsession with his perfection. Sorrow comes from resisting reality and from discontent.  One has to flow with life and accept the let downs as teachers- to grow with the good and not so good . That is the only way to equanimity. Sorrow is what we allow ourselves to reach in and wallow. Please lets live life one day at a time. I’d have said that Mc Queen. Let Go. Because you can’t change people and you cannot change the past. People are what they are.

So then what is the route to happiness? I believe that there is no such thing as permanence in any state, not even happiness. But one can snatch happy times, learn to savour the moments and like Wordsworth so aptly put it, stand and stare. Do we really ever stop to enjoy nature (whatever little of it we have left)? 

 Greenery is a great healer, and walking barefoot in the grass is therapeutic as is hearing music one enjoys. The good life is not a place you arrive at, it is a lens you bring to the place you are at right now! So snatch happiness and enjoy the journey. Because there is no destination at all but happy moments create a bank balance of fortitude and delight that you delve into when the going gets touch. It makes you into a survivor than a quitter! 

Nisha JamVwal nishajamvwal@gmail.com

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http://nishajamvwal.blogspot.com/ 

Loving, learning, working with (than Against) Our India

The Empire Strikes Back

* Globalization with a Proud Indian Heart!

@nishjamvwal

Are we still living in the Raj? I mean in our heads? Sycophants to foreign brands? Bowing and scraping to the white sahibs and scoffing at Indian people, brands, cars, clothes? 

Did we not learn a hard, bitter lesson all those years ago, with the Britt’s treating us like natives and riffraff? I mean what greater shock do we expect to hit us again until we wake up and smell the coffee? Or in this case the home-grown Darjeeling aromatic brew? To shake us out of this enamored trance where all things from foreign shores with ticket priced upwards of a few hundreds of dollars look attractive? 

Observe the current scenario guys and hold your head up proudly. We’re the flavor of the year, or maybe even the decade. The roles are currently reversed. The white sahib’s need us to spend, because Indians are nearly the only ones spending, travelling, wearing and wining. Stylishly. Indian takeovers of global companies is a proud trend and I could just go on and on citing the global takeovers by Indians of foreign companies, the many new factories that Indian companies are putting up overseas, Indian national’s acquiring foreign software companies and BPO’s . I want you to sit up and notice just a few that stood out and made me have Goosebumps of pride in the last decade..............

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Sex In The City

Sexual Trends In Our Times 

@nishjamvwal

We live in times of low attention spans, where all joys of the stomach and flesh are available for grabs, at the drop of a hat (or mobile in the now?) ! Sex Romance Love, all confused for each other?

Wham Bam Thank You Maam

In this super fast age we might just have misunderstood- the urgency to get into the wham- bam-thank-you-ma’am mode -for love, romance and poetry. 

My film actor friend shares with me "its like brushing my teeth, a function for life, what's all the ado about anyway"? That indeed is a point of view I hadn't considered at all!!!

I'm privy to a sea change from the times a Madhubala just exchanged glances with Guru Dutt, to a Anushka Sharma who endearingly (I must admit) sleeps with Ranvir Singh in 'Band Baja Barat' and has no regrets the next morning. She's self assured and confident of her decision. So its not all bad, and we don't have to be judgmental about mature decisions, but we worry when it sets the stage for hurt and pain. When there is pressure to jump the gun especially by the man.  When all that is desired , right after finding a person attractive, is to cut to the chase and get it all over and done with. The immense pressure to make it all physical without the amorous ‘courtship’ is then a cause for worry. When it is meaningless and like a mundane function , 'brushing one's teeth' is what I was informed!!!

 The magic of the friendship, chemistry, companionship leading up to romance is part of that special high that is unmissable. Is the lingering sensuous fragrance of Romance edging toward the dinosaur age? Even the very once shy Bollywood has moved to the sex first thought later mode. Deepika Padukone is most comfortable with enjoying the moment for the sake of the moment after downing several drinks in 'Love Aaj Kal'. Sex as experiment, as a so called natural physical need, as casual as a peck on the cheek to my thinking could be an excuse for lack of restraint.

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Hrithik Roshan's Mum In Law's Life Tips Through Trial

Survival, Triumph & Life Tips with Zarine Khan

                                                       

@nishjamvwal 

Sanjay Khan’s wife, Hrithik Roshan’s mum-in- law, Zayed Khan's mother- all that she might be, but all that comes later. Zarine Khan was a model and became a personality in her own right over the years. An entrepreneur of repute, despite all odds that come with being a Bollywood wife (often).

I’d always noticed how she stood apart from the noise, metaphorically speaking. Even in those times, in his zenith, when Sanjay Khan was preoccupied with strong pulls and hazards of the kind notorious to Bollywood, it is said that she held her own with dignity. Surprizingly Zarine stayed self assured, never insecure.  What is it that gave her succor when most women would crumble with fear of their future, insecurities, self doubt and pain?

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What is Love, Romance, Dating, Attraction and Sex

 Ishq Wala Love

Love can mean a lot of things to a lot of people. In today’s age of instancy, chats, ‘crack kick’s’ with orgies it may mean a transient sexual encounter that comes and goes, poof! -Before you know it your in -out - disoriented - disillusioned. And to regroup you’ve jumped into another quagmire. The urge for heady stimulation is just that. A need for adrenalin rush.

I’ve always viewed love however, as a timeless ethereal fragrance that lingers, warms, gives meaning to moments and stays with me forever. 

For a parent, a friend , a lover or an army for its General. Like a glow, that enlivens, especially enervating in those bleak moments that I’ve often seen in a life of troughs and triumphs. 

For a spouse , the desire to meet, hang out and be with each other, without crowding the space with people always, but being in one-ness and companionship and friendship, through life's challenges.

Love comes in various avtaars. For my neighbour whom I want to meet, despite time constraints and no common social connectivity, my friends who make me want to make them laugh with weird stories- even at my cost, my terrier puppy who makes me want to squeeze him and eat him up with violent passionate love, my parents who draw the strings of my heart to near pain, my man, who brings that feeling of effulgence, luminosity and sunshine into my every moment.

When love is intertwined with romance and attraction it is that heady mix of magic that gives wings to your feet and makes you smile every time you think of your loved one. Countless movies, paintings, poems, songs have embalmed and eulogized this high note in an otherwise tough ‘womb to tomb’ journey. It is indeed love that makes the world go round. Not gravity and planetary orbits. Look at it objectively- Without love life is a mundane machinery of ingestion, defecation, ejaculation, with empty notes and moments that fill a careworn existence. The x-factor that takes it to another orbit of ‘high’ is the very impractical love.

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User-Friendly Rich Boyfriends & Influential Friends! Kareena Kapoor Chronicles It For Bollywood

KALUGS NEW 'LOVE YOU'

Whatever happened to the friends you stood and stared with. The ones you met because you wanted to ‘hang out’ with, for no reason but that you liked each other. Not ‘loved’ each other instantly, but grew fond of over time and most importantly tide. High-tide. Not because you wanted to network, raise money, sponge on, but because you wanted to chat, read, grow and know together. Yes, I know, it’s all very old fashioned and not at all ‘cool’. So then my question is, what is cool? To have boyfriends who ‘buy you presents’, ‘pick you up and drop you and spend on you’ , “have a big home in a good place” to free-load on until you find someone ‘richer’ you can free-load on and ‘butter-up’? Or you dump him when he doesn’t deliver on the picking up dropping and big bucks?

Two girls standing cheek to cheek saying ‘loooooove you” in a shrill sing-song voice to each other. They are posing for a BBM picture to declare their love for each other to the world. Never mind what is in their hearts. The heart is full of what you can extract from your friend to better your prospects in life. After all this is supposed to be a kalyug phenomenon. Where love is the most easily abused word. Like toilet paper. Let’s not even get into loyalty and longevity. ‘Love you’ in today’s lingo usually means, I have ‘x’ number of agendas with you, you are useful to me and I intend to milk you for all you’ve got. Once I’m ‘done’ with you, I’ll just evaporate. 
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Kunal Kohli Essay's Romances with Rani Mukherjee, Karina Kapoor & Amisha Patel

- What Is His Personal Take? 

Fanaa, the Bollywood Movie set in Kashmir where Aamir Khan romances Kajol, was for me one of the more poignant love stories I’ve seen in recent Hindi Filmlore.  Kunal Kohli, the director and writer of this romance has explored the themes of love and interplay between the dynamics of a man woman relationship. 

He has said so much in his films about love and romance, and I am curious as to what he finds attractive in a woman? What in a relationship attracts him and excites him ? And most importantly, while decoding the man woman chemistry in Teri Meri Kahani, Hum Tum and Mujhse Dosti Karoge- how much of him exists in his movies?

He has essayed romances with Rani Mukherji, Kajol, Amisha Patel, Kareena Kapoor and Deepika Padukone where a subliminal message seems to come through, literally like a conversation spoken aloud by him on celluloid, on the subject of romance and love. I am curious!

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Salman Khan & Shah Rukh Khan are'nt the only grown-ups with fall-outs in friendships

BOLLYWOOD ISN'T THE ONLY PLACE PEOPLE FIGHT.......

An excitable voice across the phone line. Tanisha demands that her friend Anita show solidarity. “This is your true test of friendship” insists Tanisha, who's taken cudgels with another friend, and expecting all her close friends, including Anita, to take sides. “Where is your loyalty? If you go to her party then we can never speak again Anita.” she declares.

No it was not a squabble of young schoolgirls, it was women in their thirties and forty’s squabbling over breaking up, making up, taking sides and solidarity. Yes, maturity is not a given and people do sometimes become even more childish than kids fighting in grade two or three. Have you not heard of Salman Khan and Shah Rukh Khan's falling out and Bollywood being called to take sides. In 2008 the Bollywood badshah Shah Rukh took a dig at Salman at a party, flippantly joking about his relationship with Aishwarya. 


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The Bal Thackeray Charisma with Nisha JamVwal

Recently

The Humane Side Of Bal Thackeray 

@nishjamvwal

What are the key differentiators that make one human being so loved and celebrated and another unsung. 
This is the thought that occurred to me when I witnessed the last journey for the much loved, flamboyant Balasaheb, known for his provocative speeches and for crossing all political and social boundaries with much aplomb.

It seems like yesterday that we shared a glass of white wine with his preferred snack , ‘suran’. Under the enigmatic personality was a man with an engaging sense of humour and a strong point of view. So he allowed you to engage in a discussion, but very strongly put forward his. I’d call that special ingredient that engaged millions ‘charm’,  some possess it and some just cannot acquire it, hard as they might work, because I believe it belongs to those that have the gene ingrained within.


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'Student Of The Year', Alia Bhatt's Film Foray & The Captain of Her Ship

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Bhatt says Tiger Mom's are not guaranteed to create successes ! Quite the Opposite!

My Mum is The Captain of my ship

The Big Bold World of Bollywood. - A petite  young girl makes her foray with none other than the Large-scale-luxury-format film maker Karan Johar’s ‘Student Of The Year’. I notice a distinct sense of quiet confidence and a sense of non-nonchalance toward it all. Maybe it comes from the fact that she was a child artist in her father’s film ‘Sangharsh’? ‘No’, she corrects me vociferously, ‘that was a long time ago. That might be just a tiny part of it. The main reason for it all is my mother, Soni Razdan. She’s not just my mother but my strength, the reason I can be self assured. My values and principles come from her. I feel awful when I lose my temper and tell her to keep quiet- she is the most understanding person in my life.”

Best Friend Trouble?

How Do You Handle A Painful Friend?

Tweet Nisha @nishjamvwal

How do we handle a good friend who  often pokes us and pricks our self esteem and prods us to confront ourselves in a manner that we would rather not. Do we do away with the friend or how do we handle it all was a question my friend Bingo posted on her facebook status. 

-She seemed to suggest the friend becomes a pain in the neck that we're better off without because she was at a stage in life when she is fairly attuned to what she wants and has chosen to be. To the many responses she elicited on her ‘wall’ the most balanced ones echoed my belief strongly.

My life has been about friends who have been part of my growth and metamorphosis, who have kept me firmly grounded in a world where it is easy to fly away with your fabulous fantasy of yourself. A best friend becomes like a spouse, whom we have to navigate and grow with. People are not like toilet tissue- you don't 'discard' them- you  also allow them to know when they're being a pain in the neck. You know, I've actually enjoyed the meanderings of understanding the ups and downs of relationships. You begin to take the good with the bad, as my good friend Tanaz so wisely said just yesterday!

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