There are times when you remember some particular things. Memory is an interesting stuff — you can forget where was the last time you put your keys or your phone; but somehow you able to recall a particular memory of something happened on a certain date, in a certain hour, and at certain emotion.
I think that what makes some memories are stronger: Emotion.
Somehow, I remembered this passing memory; it wasn’t really important or life-changing, but it’s here.
It was on 2008-2009. I was in this bad emotional state (I just broke up with somebody who I used to seeing — wait, is that considered as “broke up”? Because we never really formally date each other ?) and I had this online friend. We used to talk using Yahoo!Messenger (Y!M was still a big thing back then. We haven’t got WhatsApp or Telegram or even Facebook Messenger. Things were pretty, um, relic ?) Apparently, he too just went through a bad breakup with his longtime girlfriend.
Interestingly, we never really talked about it. We never informed each other that “hey, I just broke up and I feel shitty”-some sort of thing.
We only talked about “how do you know if you have found the right person for your life?” or “I feel so lost, and I hate that. I wonder what should I do.”
No, we never get involved romantically. At all.
We were two lonely people, met through the Internet, and we talked with each other because somehow we trusted each other; and that’s funny. That’s really ironically funny. We didn’t know each other really well. We were acquaintances. But we talked about our problems like we have known each other for decades; usually in the middle of the night — because that was the time where both of us were active doing our projects, night owls.
He told me about patience. I told him about trust. It was funny, because we were impatient and betrayed. We talked about it for days. Months.
Our trust, our judgments, our feelings, our thoughts, our opinions, our anger, our confusions, our hopes.
Nights and nights passed by. Usually started by a simple “hi” followed with a certain emoji.
In the end, we cheered one another.
“Man, I wish you all the best.”
“You too.”
And not long after that, we found the right person for each one of us.
Then the conversation ceased to end.
He’s happily married now, and if I’m not mistaken, he has two children.
I’m happily married now, and I am sure I still have one child 😁
Now, we never really talked about it anymore. In fact, we never really talk with each other like we used to be. We still follow each other on social media, but that’s that. Especially with me taking “sabbatical leave” from social media accounts, we rarely talk — even for mundane things. Our late-night chats buried inside memories — waiting for times like this: popping out inappropriately at 10:30 PM.
The point of this whole post? Friendship exists, even on most unlikely place, time, and situation; such as 01:00 AM chatroom.
