Friends are important

Read a beautiful article about male friendship. It says that the problem of men having either very few or absolutely no friends at all has become very severe post Covid.

In an office situation, the men would bond over lunch at office and occasional post office hours binge comprising drinks and dinner. Covid, however, forced everyone to work from home, making offices unoccupied and forlorn places. Even though Covid has subsided, return to office is only partial, and offices are nowhere booming with people like in the past.

However, the main focus of the article is sustainability of the male friendship especially in the old age, when office colleagues are no longer at hand and old friends are either incapacitated or no longer existent! The article has a beautifully nuanced anecdote, where two lonely men in immediate neighbourhood would sit idly and look at each other, without caring to make an effort to know each other, leave apart forging a friendship. The anecdote ends on a tragic note with the surviving neighbour looking at the ambulance carrying the dead body of the other, leaving him worried about his own fate!

The author of the article suggests that middle and old aged men need to avoid loneliness by pursuing hobbies and hanging out with buddies for occasional game of poker ( just quoting the author; it could be anything from cards to Ludo to golf to table tennis) and drinks that would provide a person a happy diversion from solitude, loneliness and inactivity. The article specifically stresses about the need for men to socialise as women are inherently more outgoing type, prone to networking. Women also bare their hearts more readily to fellow women, whereas men hate to be seen as emotionally fragile even amongst best of buddies.

The article also touches upon cross sexual friendship, which is not quite relevant in our milieu, as even in western society, the issue of sexual relation in such friendships is quite pronounced.

The article fascinated me deeply as I related to it almost in totality. A bit of solitude has indeed set in post retirement though I must confess that I have traveled quite a bit, have a like minded spouse who shares quite a few common interests and have many friends – my erstwhile colleagues and others! I am also a member of two groups – one comprising my school mates and other my batchmates who joined my previous organisation along with me and with whom I bonded during extended training programmes. However, both these groups are virtual in nature, with interactions limited to social media and occasional phone call as members are spread all over. But with advancing age, interactions on such group are only likely to come down and engagements fewer. My wife has her own company and engagements and cannot be always available to cut my solitude. The need, therefore, is to bond more with a group having similar interests, hobbies, passions and compassion for one another. Solitude can lead to accelerated aging and depression that could ultimately cause other age related ailments.

I treat this article as a wake up call for all those who are just lazing out after their active professional life and that too all by themselves. Let’s reach out, meet people, enjoy occasional binge, travel , pursue a passion and avoid solitude and depression.