The Ties That Bind

Last week, I was invited to a class reunion party but I declined to go because I had church that night. If I were to be honest, going to church was also an excuse to not attend the reunion. Why was I so reluctant to go to the reunion? I had not contacted them for a long time after I graduated from secondary school. I let my connection to them falter and fade into the shadows of my past. Occasionally, I think of them and reminisce about the times we had been through together. Yet, I never felt the urge to reconnect with them again. I let my friendship with them fizzle out. I chose to let it go. Refusing to go to the reunion needles at my conscience. Was I wrong to not want to see them or talk to them again? I'm afraid that even if I do meet them, I will not recognise them or remember their names. I imagine myself standing awkwardly by the side as everyone else talked, joked and laughed with each other as if time had never passed at all. As if we could just pick up where we left off.

***

Last Thursday, an old friend of mine called me and invited me to go mountain climbing with her. Another old friend will be joining us. Shamefully, I thought about refusing her offer. The moment of hesitation passed. I agreed to go. When I met up with them, there was an air of uncertainty between us. It had been so long. I never sought them out. They have new friends and new lives. They remained the same in some ways but it was clear that they had changed. We all have. When we talked about our respective lives, I realised how diverged our roads have become. The more we walk our own paths, the further we are from each other until one day, we will be to one another merely people whose paths converged for a single moment in time, never to meet again. Like perpendicular lines.

***

The ties that bind us are so frail and brittle. Stretch it too thin and it will break. A severed connection. Is that what will happen to my new friends? Will we eventually become strangers to each other or will we remain friends for the rest of our lives? Well, whatever the case, I am glad and grateful that they are in my life right now. It is enough.

P.S. May God bless you.