Of all the things I have learnt from you, I treasure tolerance the most.
Like I wrote in one of my earlier posts, I met my best friend a few years back. There is a saying that the Universe gives you everything that you truly need, and I am glad I met her.
We meet many people in our lives. Some would stay for a season, and give us lessons and joys, and a dream or two, for the rest of our lives. Some would come, make us home for a day (or a night) and leave us wondering if they truly happened. And then there are some who come, and stay within us, forever.
We met each other a few summer’s back. Introverts have a way of knowing one another and giving each other incredible amount of space. Even when we started getting comfortable with each other, speaking to each other outside common space was limited to sharing memes and photos about giving each other that wonderful gift introverts love — SPACE.
2017–2018 were years of existential crisis. Like a silver lining, she chose to come closer. We also travelled together a fair bit in that period. All of them were outcomes of work and diktats of social commitments’ we introverts deeply abhor. Looking back, I cannot thank my stars enough that these travels happened. I would never meet my Rafiki otherwise.
We started spending a lot of time together starting mid-2018. I do not know if anyone else would have picked me up and let me in their lives given the state that I was in at that point of time. Looking back, of all the things I have learnt from her, I treasure tolerance the most.
We spent my birthday in 2018 talking and drinking sangria at our favourite café. For the first time in a long time, I had started sleeping well at night. Love and a sense of being understood can move mountains. And I was just a mere mortal. It moved every being within me.
Over the next two years till date, we evolved, as much singularly as collectively. I learnt a lot from her — unconditional love, unflinching truth, disarming honesty, and undying tolerance. And that not everything which has sugar and hence technically a sweet is bad. Especially if it is a cheesecake shared with your best friend, at your favourite patisserie. :-)
P.S : Rafiki is an indirect Quranic name derived from the Arabic root “R-F-Q > Rafīq”, meaning “friend, comrade, associate, colleague, companion, fellow, gentle, kind”. I always wanted to find another word for deep friendships. Rafiki from faraway Arabia, thank you.
