The Einstein Remix!!

Nostalgia is a most intriguing emotion.. It can make you happy and sad at the same time.. Happy at remembering the good times you have had in the past.. And sad at realizing that those times are no more.. Whenever you meet old friends, you go back to those wonderful days of the past, recollect incidents, and enjoy reliving them.. And all the while, you also feel a tinge of sadness, at not being able to press the rewind button of your life..

Nikhil was in Hyderabad for the last couple of weeks.. And we spent a lot of time hanging out together.. along with lots of other friends from past and present.. This brings me to an interesting facet of life and friendship.. I call this “The Relativity Theory of Friendship”.. I person’s life can be divided into different compartments, his childhood and school days, his college years, his higher education period, his working life with his 1st employer, 2nd employer and so on.. All this while, a person keeps making friends.. And when he moves from one compartment of his life to another, he leaves the friends he had made during that period behind.. Or lets say, looses regular touch with them.. For example, your leave our school friends behind on going to college.. At times, friends from one compartment continue to be with you in the next compartment too.. like some one who was with you in college and goes on to work in the same organization..

Each of these compartments in ones life form a different “Frame of Reference”.. The friends one forms in one compartment exist inside that Frame of Reference, so that when you are talking to them, you try to go back to those days and remember incidents inside that Frame of Reference.. Example, when interacting with your school friends, you recall your school days.. Again, a friend who has been with you in 2 compartments in your life, will exist in 2 Frames of Reference, and you can talk with him across those 2 frames..

Now comes the interesting part.. It is when you interact with a number of your friends belonging to different Frames of Reference, at the same time, say in a party, that you realize the true impact of this theory.. A topic which you and your school friend find interesting may not be all that appealing to another friend of yours, who is working with you now.. and vise-versa.. This is because the 2 friends belong to separate frames of Reference.. Swapping, managing and relating these different Frames of Reference becomes an unenviable task..

Now here is a theory that will have Einstein turning in his grave.. right!!

"When a man sits with a pretty girl for an hour, it seems like a minute. But let him sit on a hot stove for a minute -- then it's longer than any hour. That's relativity! " - Albert Einstein