The Vanishing Boat

There is a scene in the film, 'Dil Chahta Hai' where the three friends Aakash (Aamir Khan), Sameer (Saif Ali Khan) and Siddharth (Akshaye Khanna) are looking over at the beach from a fort. Aakash says to his friends that Goa is such a beautiful place. And that they should come here at least once in a year. Sameer seconds the view but Siddharth remains quiet and keeps looking in front of himself at the sea. Sameer asks what he is looking at. Siddharth responds, "I am looking at the boat right there which would disappear soon after some time. You know, the three of us are like that boat who will go looking for our dreams sooner or later. And maybe, our dreams are different from each other's.”

At this point, Sameer says, “I don’t know why you are saying all this. We are friends Sid. Friends forever.”

Sid responds, “Of course, we are. But who knows which way anyone’s life takes him.” Turning to Aakash, he adds, “Have you ever thought that leave alone every year, it would be difficult to meet each other even once in a decade.”

At this, Aakash laughs, comes forward and assures him. “Nothing like that will happen, Sid. We always were and always will be friends.”

Wouldn't it be nice if our lives turned out that way? If we could stay close to our friends for life. If they never went away from us. If we could say like Aakash did, “We always were and always will be friends.”

Today, it's easier than ever to stay in touch. With technology, the means to communicate on virtual platforms has increased manifold. But the virtual connection will never be able to make up for the physical presence of your BFFs (best friends forever), will it? And as Siddharth said, it starts to seem to us, “...that leave alone every year, it would be difficult to meet each other even once in a decade.”

When in college, I was optimistic that I would keep alive the friendships that I had formed. But as I have come to see now, it truly is difficult to keep in touch the way I once believed I would. Friends are going their separate ways. Onto where their respective dreams and destinies are taking them. And sadly for me, their paths are different now from mine. I do miss them. I want to see them and say hi in person. But their availability has become a rarity.

I almost feel sometimes like a part of William Blake's 'Songs of Experience' series of poems where the child finds the world to be rather different from how he had envisioned it in his childhood or in his 'Songs of Innocence'.

I am also reminded of the famous poem on friendship by Charles Hansen Towne, 'Around the corner'. In the poem, Towne says:

Around the corner I have a friend

In this great city that has no end;
Yet the days go by, and weeks rush on,
And before I know it a year is gone,
And I never see my old friend's face,
For Life is a swift and terrible race.
He knows I like him just as well,
As in the days when I rang his bell,
And he rang mine. We were younger then,
And now we are busy, tired men:
Tired with playing a foolish game,
Tired with trying to make a name.
"To-morrow," I say, "I will call on Jim
"Just to show that I'm thinking of him."
But to-morrow comes -- and to-morrow goes,
And distance between us grows and grows.
Around the corner -- yet miles away,...
"Here's a telegram sir,..."
"Jim died today."
And that's what we get, and deserve in the end:
Around the corner, a vanished friend.

There is a lesson in this for the future. Life is better with friends than without them. It's good to know that you have some like-minded people who understand your world-view like few others can. And we have to take control of our friendship before the foolish game of life starts to take us for a ride that we can't get off of.

One of the most treasured things in life are memories. And they are all the more colourful with such people in them. Our friendships are also one of the legacies that we as people will be leaving as we depart this earth. The legacy of a few good people who will remember us for good.

Life is not all about trophies and triumphs. Let's also start working on some other things that matter so that the boat doesn't vanish from our horizon.