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by Ria Chopra 

Time has this timeless quality of retaining the connotations you formed for it as a child. June makes me think of summer vacations, even if I haven’t had those in years. April feels like a new beginning, because that’s when our academic year began (although now it’s the start of the financial year, for me). And August, whose first Sunday was designated ‘Friendship Day’, always makes me think about my friends.

A decade ago, when I was in school, this month defined friendship, numerically. Friendship Day was ostensibly a wholesome occasion, but it was also, secretly, a competition — who, at the end of the day, would have the most friendship bands? Ten years later, I’m definitely older, hopefully wiser, and thankfully, I’ve learnt that friendship is not a competition you need to win. Ten years later, my adult friendships are also not defined by who ties me a band and who doesn’t.

But then what, exactly, defines them at all?

As we grow older and life expands, so do the roles that people play in our lives. Which means that friendships outgrow their clear-cut, well-labeled boxes — becoming far too deep, much too honest, and too expansive to specifically categorize.

But just because adult friendships are hard to label in the traditional ways dictated by grammar and society, doesn’t mean we can’t invent our own definitions. Here are some non-traditional ways in which I define them:

1. The friends who have met your parents, and charmed them. Your mother trusts them more than she trusts you, and your father has hour-long conversations with them about their jobs. Friends who know that your family makes rajma chawal on Sundays. And who are comfortable enough to invite themselves to eat it.

2. Friends you met in one context, but were far too lovable to stay restricted to that part of your life alone. ‘Sports friends’ who don’t do sports together anymore but meet every Saturday - because if you play on the same team long enough, you get into the habit of having each other’s backs.

‘Debating friends’ who all stopped debating and find even sitting in silence fun now. ‘Colony friends’ who moved away and though you don’t share a PIN code anymore, you love each other the same.

3. Friends who are also ex-lovers, because you both realized you like each other too much to become ex-lovers who were once friends.

Even Anne from Persuasion agrees: losing a friend feels worse than losing a romantic partner. Keep them close.

4. Friends who know your therapist by name. Friends who know your other friends (even the ones they’ve never met) by name. Friends who make the effort to remember all these people they don’t know simply because they care about you; the thread that binds them all together.

5. Friends who you’ve had ‘the talk’ with — your vulnerable revelation of that one thing that impacts your life. It can range from smaller things (‘I had a really bad experience with vodka once so NEVER bring it near me’) to bigger ones (‘I have low BP and can faint at any time, just give me water and call my mom, do NOT panic’) to those that are life-changing (‘I’m clinically depressed’). These friends will absorb your secret like plants absorb sunlight, internalizing it and then releasing it in a completely different form: love, affection, and a lifetime of them looking out for you.

6. Friends whose houses feel like home. You don’t know their address but you can always find your way to their house, and isn’t that what matters?

7. Friends you made online through some serendipitous Internet coincidence, and while you haven’t met them in person ever, they make you feel less alone.

8. Friends who you have lost touch with, slowly over the years, but still kept in your heart. You last spoke in 2017, but if they call you at 2 AM and say they need help, you’ll find a way to come.

The first Sunday of this August, I didn’t get any bracelets, but my sister’s wedding photographers (finally) sent over the wedding video. Among all the glimpses of people laughing, crying, and eating, there is one where all my friends are standing together. It probably looks like just another shot to everyone, but it’s poignant for me. To see all these people from different parts of my life together in one frame; two of them laughing at some inside joke even though they'd met for the first time that day.

It’s warm to think of how indescribably strange and magical adult friendships are. For many Augusts now my wrists have been empty, but my heart has been full, and my life is brighter with all my friends in it.

Go hug a friend today.

Ria is a culture & life writer who moonlights as a niche Twitter microceleb. You can find her @riachops on Twitter and @riachops on Instagram!

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