While as a teacher I might roll my eyes and ‘sush’ a student engaged in an animated conversation in the classroom, I do myself look out eagerly for opportunities to do just that…talk…talk…talk…

Its funny that I should do so, especially since my attempts at socializing are not many and I do actively discourage anyone who tries to invite me to step out of my home for any event, visit or something of that sort.

Though I am largely amiable, the people I look out to connect have been pretty constant, despite my attempts to change that.

Three days of break from work gave me ample opportunity to call up friends,especially friends from college and school. Friends largely from times old, when assumptions were less and masks were none.

What is this yearning to connect, I have been trying to understand. What is the need, why this urge,so strong that I might just come across as being a little over enthusiastic..

In fact, the other day, I did apologize for my enthusiasm to connect but my friend was kind and said she is happy to talk in Malayalam after a long time. And we did talk, for a long time. It felt truly great.

Is it something peculiar with me, I wondered, thinking of this deep desire to reach out and connect?

Is it that I am seeking attention?

Most of my friends are usually so engaged in their personal lives that they have little or no time for small talk. And I sometimes seem to have all the time in the world to want to talk and be heard and to hear and to connect.

Technology has made it easy for us to connect these days. We can easily locate a friend or someone we want to talk to but then do we have the time or the inclination for it?

Is it the vacuum in one’s personal life that makes him or her to want to talk to others?

When I listen to my students, friends and family, I understand how deep and how rooted is this desire to be heard, to be talked to, to be understood, to be asked after.

A friend of mine shared how she has successfully qualified to be a special education teacher, a student confided of having got an opportunity to star in a movie, another said, she might consider pursuing MPhil, my mother has found time to learn a few more shlokas in Sanskrit,some body challenged me to visit all the note worthy places in Bangalore and show her the pics! Honest communication, straight from the heart is the at the core of any relationship, be it with friends, family or at work.

It is just enough to have someone who calls up to ask’how are you?’and that I learnt from my younger brother!

So, keep the communication going, even if it means you are needling someone, you never know, it might just be helping you or the other person.