Small is the new Big

I promised a good friend I’d watch the Euro 2012 finals with him the other night,but found myself in a dilemma shortly after when another good friend invited me over. Okay I’ll be honest,she was a better friend,and I had to excuse myself from the prior engagement with as much grace as I could without sounding like a prim puss chickening out of sports night.

Nevertheless,I gave the football fanatic the truth of the matter,and thanked my stars I hadn’t made up a story about pet emergencies or alien abductions when I ran into him sipping coffee in my friend’s lane a surreal three hours later. Wise decision,opined my immigrant girl friend,who never ignores a phone call when in Pune for fear that the caller is lurking behind the next tree and waiting to pounce. With only a handful of social hotspots one can properly amuse oneself in ,it’s a wonder we aren’t all falling over each other in shudders and gasps of recognition. (This might also have something to do with the enviable fact that my friend lives in the heart of Koregaon Park)

The second run-in occurred the following morning as we made our bleary-eyed way to our favourite breakfast place for a pick-me-up. One of the psychological luxuries of being a freelancer (as there are no material ones) is to be among the select few who can pore over a menu in the middle of Monday morning,but even that exclusivity was snatched from me when I detected an old classmate on the fringes of my vision.

That’s another ghastly outcome of the smallness of our world – unexpectedly running into someone you know with last night’s makeup trying to run off your face. This can become especially perilous when dealing with old school friends,who as a breed have a tendency to measure every change in your appearance and personality over the years and dutifully pass on the word. I couldn’t tell whether the girl in the oversized t-shirt nodding and smiling at me politely was suffering the same embarrassment or not,but it’s safe to assume she was. Nobody likes being caught with their pants or their wits down.

But as I sat to write this it made me ponder that I probably wouldn’t have seen my guy friend for a month and my schoolmate for a year (if at all) were it not for the ill-timed bump ins. And I certainly wouldn’t have met the guy’s pretty female friend whom I’ll be teasing him about for a while. A random,spontaneous conversation in one’s natural environment versus a pre-planned,perfectly executed evening in a carefully chosen environment… well,I don’t know,which one would you choose?

The author is a chess grandmaster and former national champion.