Friendships in general........

Memory of my first friend goes back to days when I was hardly 3. There was Jebin chettan and Mithun..my neighbours who were my playmates to play on mud and with blocks. I also faintly remember a swing my dad had tied to one of the trees and we three taking turns to swing.
After we shifted to a new place, again my then neighbours Alex and Ammu....became my friends....Then it was followed by many as we progressed through classes in school and then in college.
In school, we have one big advantage in building friendships - you have the same set of people in each year(Unless your parents had transferable jobs, well mine didnt..so i kinda did all my schooling in one single school) and your friendships have time to grow and mature...You start off with just friends to play games and fight, to forming your own groups later on, to taking credit and feeling on top of cloud nine to have a best best friend, then later you become a little more mature and realise that there is much more responsibilites to maintaining a friendship like trust and care.
The next big change comes when we leave school and join college. By this time we have a good ability to realise with which people we gel well...and with whom we dont..we form friendships based on our comfort levels...we are much more maturer and we accept all people who are good to us as our friends..The concept of best friends starts diminishing and the concept of close friends come in.
From college to Job, is again a change. Initially you have your friends from college also in the same work place..you add on more friends to the existing group as days go by and everything looks just like college...but no...we are wrong. In a few months we find our close gang of friends being shifted to many other work locations for new projects or for personal reasons(like marriage, higher studies etc). Initially you wont feel the change so much..but as one by one your friends starts moving on..you realize that change is inevitable. I am right now at this point in my life where I have many friends but the span of togetherness is probably just a few months. Afterwords you just cant be sure where you will be or where she/he will be.We are stil gonna be in touch with occasional mails and calls...but togetherness is only once in a while...
As you look back to school,college and workplace, school is the place which gives you the maximum amount of time for your frienships and these are friends who has actually seen you grow..College gives a little lesser time than school, but this is the time you make the most closest of friends..this is the time you actualy realise the importance of a friend as she /he sees you through your age of questions and doubts and confusions.Workplace is a place where you meet the maximum number of different people, and yes i agree we do make some very close friends out here also(well, i have) but this is where you can consider friendhsip as a basket which is never empty but...one which is always filled with different flavours as time goes by and none of the flavours are going to be in the basket for a very long time...
In my opinion, friendship is of one kind...and the basic rules apply to all friendships..
Whatever stage we are in..there is nothing that can fill the need of a friend.....and first and formost...You are your best friend...:)