The 3 a.m. Friend

My best friend and I have some amazing 3 a.m. memories. These memories span nearly three decades.

We grew up in far away cities but offloading most things going on in our lives and those deeper inside our hearts to one another, was a constant. We started off in the early 90's by writing reams of pages stuffed into postal envelopes and starting the next letter even before the reply arrived, filling each one with all possible mundane and exciting details. And our precise prediction of the date of arrival of postal reply in that technologically challenged era would simply amaze our folks.

Times changed. We grew up and branched out farther away following our respective life callings. But our communication remained constant. The world transitioned from letters, to email, to SMS, to messenger services, to wider socially networked sites, and our style of 'offloading' also adapted effortlessly. 

The topics we freely shared with one another also evolved with the times. From high school crushes, teenage rebellions, heartbreaks and board exams to progress in professional lives, finding our respective life partners to marriage, mom in laws, motherhood, now heading towards mid age mood swings and lately, even about 'missing the maid' - we had them all covered. 

The handful of personal meetings that we managed in these decades of living apart have been celebrated with our signature '3 a.m. talks' as I'd like to call them!! Our banter would simply go on and on through the night untiringly over cups of filter coffee and middle of the night snacks.  

The essence of our bond lay in the strong, free and very expressive communication that we always shared, something that was also lovingly supported by the rest of our kin too. 

Cut to 2020, both of us, apart from coping with all kinds of lockdown challenges like everyone else, are also trying to keep calm (read sane) with our respective not so small 'bundles of joy' aged 9/17 and 13/16, each of them displaying the entire gamut of characterestic growing up traits (read warm/witty/wild/wise /whacky/woeful/wonderful - as they choose to be) at their will!

Overwhelming at times, this has led to a toning down of the time and energy that we are able to spend communicating lately. Though this is only natural and we both understand and empathise with one another, we miss it nevertheless. 

As another day set in 2020, my busy bee better half decided to move to the kids room for the night to meet some work deadline and my 'soon to be adult' first born came to sleep next to me. To say that sleep schedules have gone bonkers this year, would be an understatement and we as a family are no exception. While the younger one dozed off, the teen and I got talking about random things as we lay down, well aware that one of us would bore the other to sleep very soon! 

But surprisingly there were no annoying motherly sermons and definitely no defiant teenage arrogance on display last night. What followed were few beautiful hours of diverse, deep, uninterrupted, heartfelt exchange of thoughts, emotions, stories, laughter, gossip and unadulterated bonding between two 'big girls'! There were moments when we even joked about how school hours were barely 3-4 hours away and that we should sleep, but we chatted away anyway. 

I smiled to myself often in the darkness of the night as I experienced a medley of emotions that shifted from disbelief to joy. Though my childhood friend remains irreplaceable, it felt like having her back home with me last night, as my  daughter and I caught up on some old and new stories from our lives. Suddenly, my little girl seemed all grown up. Suddenly I felt like I had found a friend at home. 

The cynical mommy inside me did try hard to warn me from getting emotionally swayed by this chance bonding that would in all likelihood vanish by breakfast time the next morning.  But I chose to push away her away for one night. I realised I was thoroughly enjoying this newfound connect with my first born and I only wanted soak it in and cherish it while it lasted. 

While my best friend and I will still continue with our endless long distance banter as and when life permits but last night I just wanted to hold on to and celebrate every bit of this feeling of possibly having found my very own '3 am friend' for life!!