They say friendships are the family we choose. But sometimes, life gives us friends we never knew we needed — and takes them away just as unexpectedly.
Between 2008 and 2012, I had a circle that was nothing short of electric. We weren’t just building businesses; we were building each other.
It was a phase of wild nights and wilder dreams. Knowledge collaboration in the day, partying hard at night, getting stoned over the weekends — we did things that today sound crazy and almost unbelievable. But that madness was our glue. It detoxed us from daily business stress, kept us alive, and taught us more than any MBA ever could.
But life, as always, had its own plans.
End of 2012, I got married. My father’s sudden hospitalization soon after shattered that rhythm. One by one, the circle started breaking — some had fallouts among themselves, some quit entrepreneurship, some got into serious personal crises, others moved abroad, and a few simply withdrew into their own worlds.
Then came COVID. Financial struggles and the survival grind tightened the last few threads. I got so entangled in rebuilding my life that those friendships, once my lifeline, drifted into oblivion.
Today, I look back and wonder: What were those friendships? Why did they feel so irreplaceable? Why do they hurt to remember?
What were they really?
Those were what I now understand as situational friendships — connections born out of a specific context, a shared madness, and a common dream. We didn’t become friends because of shared childhoods or family ties, but because we shared the same burning fire in that phase of life.
We were all entrepreneurs — each of us a little broken, a little foolish, yet unshakably hopeful. We learned from each other, fought with each other, and celebrated every tiny win like it was the end of the world.
Why do they fade?
Because life is not a constant. Priorities change. Marriage, kids, health crises, business failures, relocations — all these start pulling us in different directions. Some find new tribes, some retreat into personal solitude, and some get consumed by survival.
There’s no big betrayal or dramatic end — just a quiet drifting apart. A slow fade into silence.
Do I miss them?
Every day.
I miss the impulsive midnight drives, the heated debates that went from business models to philosophical rabbit holes, the sense of belonging to a gang that truly “got it.”
But I also know that those friendships, like beautiful old songs, belong to a time and place that can’t be recreated. They were chapters meant to end, lessons meant to be carried forward, not lived on repeat.
Some friendships are like rivers — they flow into your life, shape your shores, then find their way to the sea. You can’t hold them back, but you can always feel the shape they left on your soul.
A final whisper to that gang
Wherever you all are — running a new venture, teaching your kids to ride a bicycle in Canada, or quietly reflecting on those reckless days — I hope you feel the same warmth when you think of our nights in Adambakkam.
Some friendships are meant to be wild tides — crashing, roaring, unforgettable — before they dissolve into the larger sea of life.
AnandNataraj 