Ramblings of a 20something girl

"I'm leaving on May 15th for Bangalore. You think we can meet once before that?" My childhood and one of my closest friends told me this yesterday. She's the second person in my friend circle to tell me she's leaving Delhi. The first one in the group left Delhi for work, six months ago. Since almost half of the group were in different cities, myself included, this was a tricky request because getting everyone together for this would be difficult. Staying in the same city and trying to meet would have been no less difficult, to be honest. I'll admit this news wasn't that shocking, since she had hinted at something like this a few months ago. But when she told me she was leaving yesterday, it did hit me like a punching bag. As kids, we believe that the friends we make when we're young will remain with us forever. One can term this childhood innocence, which is a good place to be before the rocks of adulthood shatter this illusion with reality. The thing

I visit Kerala every year.  I have to for three main reasons. 1) It's my birthplace. 2) My maternal grandparents live there along with most of my relatives and 3) During the summer holidays in school, we had to go somewhere for our vacations, and Kerala was the easiest choice. The annual trips to Kerala took a break in 2020 when the Covid pandemic hit the world. With restrictions on travel being issued everywhere, our hopes of going to Kerala were also dashed that year, and the following year, and the year after. By 2022, when the restrictions on travel were eased, we booked our tickets to Kerala ASAP because we could not wait any longer.  I have always been excited about going to Kerala. IDK. There's just something about going back to your roots.           Meeting familiar faces, having jackfruit (Chakka), bananas, coconut (Karikku) and other different kinds of fruits that one gets to see only in Kerala that people grow in their backyard, discussing politics and family feuds,