Friends

I have been away for more than a month. Apologies to my readers. For the past few months I have been disturbed as well as busy. I made a decision to move from my hometown Lahore , and a whirlwind of activities related to the move followed. Why I moved? Call it wanderlust or my liking for the capital city, but now I live in Islamabad. I wanted a change, and also wanted to see if I like Islamabad better than Lahore. Of course I have lots of friends and family in Lahore but I do have some very dear friends in Islamabad too.. They have helped me and supported me through many difficult times as I passed through periods of depression and despair and have never been stingy in giving mr their time and attention despite being very busy people themselves. It is a paradox of my life that my family has been unsupportive in trying times but my friends came through for me always. After my fathers death,and other catastrophes, I think a big reason of why I'm alive are my friends, wherever they live. Let my glory be, like Yeats, that I had such friends.I once read a "test" for friendship: you know if anybodys your friend or not, just wake them up at 2 am and see! Well, from that criteria, I have so many friends! Those who did not let me down when those whom I trusted most did.Now this is about friends right now, not loved ones. So I hope my loved ones don't take offense at this excessive allusion to friends, but it is the truth. Trying to settle down as quickly as I can, but a homestead is something I cannot do without. So hopefully I will have it soon and would love to see people I love, adore and respect my friends and loved ones, join me there. I am a strange person I think. I seem to love my friends as much as I love my family. I cannot distinguish between the two. Perhaps they are the family I chose for myself. Being in love with somebody is different, he or she is The one or at least should be, I am a bit old-fashioned in this era of multiple partners, but my friends I love with the same affection as my children, or my siblings( the ones that I do love) is it me or others " love" friends like this too? We do not like to say we do, we say we " like" them.I have no idea, perhaps my readers can tell me about it. I have been disturbed at work, at this new trend of harassing female officers by some male superiors. I had four females working under me, and saw this trend and did not like it. I have had this experience once in my life but I withstood it well thank god. The only thing to do in such circumstances is fight it and tell people around you that it is happening. This is the only way to fight any kind of abuse. Disclosure makes the culprit stop super quick. Best of luck to my juniors coz females have finally arrived in the civil service, and nobody can hinder their path to glory. Au Revoir.