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Will You Be My GF?

Discussion in 'Wednesdays with Varalotti' started by varalotti, Mar 20, 2008.

  1. varalotti

    varalotti IL Hall of Fame

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    Will You Be My GF?

    ‘Varalotti, I think you have the psychological disease of always walking over the cliff, standing too close to the precipice ready to fall any time. You were saved several times. But this time, you had it!’

    The minds of the wonderful moderators have already started working overtime. This time I am not going to ask you to sit with me and talk about adaptation and survival of the fittest. Nor am I going to ask you to be my valentine and talk about Paulo Coelho. Nor ask you to play with me and discuss the winning strategy.

    For change this time I am doing to talk about what I really meant when I chose the title. Yes!

    Friendship between men and women has always been at best a very slippery area. We have had hundreds of stories, quite a lot of films and millions of real-life incidents.

    Why go far? This great site is one illuminating example of man-woman friendships. And a number of threads in this site have focussed on extra-marital affairs, platonic friendships developing into something else, well-meaning men and women slipping into life-destroying affairs just like that. (Even yours truly has written quite a lot on this subject).

    In a little more than a month’s time I will become a Golden Earthlite (if that term can be coined and used). A Golden ILite is one who has made a thousand posts; a golden earthlite is one who has celberated golden jubilee in this world, I mean, has completed 50 years of existence.

    When I could not sleep the other day I was musing on my women friends and the relationship I have been having with them. (Indhu, I know you wont come to this thread; but even if you come, please think that this is a work of fiction. For others, it is real, realer than the realest real)

    I have seen many men of my age being caught in nasty affairs even though they do not have many women friends. But with about half a dozen close women friends, I have never sunk into an affair. I should attribute this to the inexplicable Grace of God.

    I should also hasten to add that being an accountant and an auditor I had my own system of internal and external controls to avoid my slipping into an affair.

    Till I was 35, I always kept a distance from women. (‘Don’t blow your own trumpet, Sridhar. The women kept a safe distance from you.’ Who else but my DW can make such a comment?) With women who always had a seductive look for me (‘bluff, bluff’) I always maintained a minimum distance of a mile.

    When I was around 40 , I had attained a fairly good balance between my harmones and my head. Only then did I venture out to seek good friends from the opposite sex.

    Even then I carefully avoided women whom I can see or relate to every day. I chose friends who do not live in my place, those who live far away and with those the only means of communication is the Email or the telephone.

    Those relationships deepened my understanding of the human nature. It is no coincidence that I started having women friends when I was around 40 and that I started writing almost at the same time. Naturally many of my stories focussed on women.

    I have described three of the closest women friends in my thread The Other Women in My Life. The purpose of this thread is to describe a few tender moments I had with them.
     
  2. varalotti

    varalotti IL Hall of Fame

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    I have a male friend who keeps on sending A jokes to my mail ID. Once he wanted me to forward the jokes to some other friend. I was in a hurry that day and by mistake forwarded the joke to my close woman friend.

    I realised the mistake only later in the day when I was searching in the sent mail for some information. I wrote a detailed note of apology and sent it across to my friend. I told her that it was clearly not my intention and that even if she ends the relationship with me on that count, I would still understand.

    I thought that I have lost a good friend. But that wonderful person amazed me with her endearing reply. She told me clearly that my sending that kind of a lewd joke was not consistent with my earlier mails.

    That itself was proof enough of my innocence. She told me to forget the incident.

    And to prove to me that she was not hurt by that, she sent me back a joke, more intense than mine, just to tell me that she was more amused than annoyed. We are good friends till today. (Touch wood!)

    I was deeply disturbed by what another friend of mine (woman) told me. She is a multi-talented woman. She can write poetry, run a company, manage people and can relate to any person. And she is single.

    She always conveys to me in clear terms that she feels safe and secured in my company and will not hold back anything from me. She told me about one of her male friends who tried to approach her sexually.

    “Sridhar, does ‘single’ mean ‘available’ ? “ she asked with exasperation.

    I did not pity her. I pitied the man who lost such a precious friend. To seek sexual pleasures from such a wonderful human being, well, to me, it looked like consulting the city’s best cardiologist for common cold. You are wasting your time, the cardiologist’s time and surely he can’t cure your cold.

    Indusladies community is a wonderful answer to the man-woman relationship problem. Here most of us do not see each other most of the time. We are known, loved and judged only by what we write.



    Again your physical appearance or my physical appearance is not there, either to attract or to distract us from the real friendship. I am proud to belong to this wonderful community and prouder still to call myself a friend of about 20000 gracious women from all over the world.

    Now what do you think of the question? What is your answer? Tell me honestly, didn’t you think that GF means “girl friend”? No. It does not.

    I only asked you, “Will you be my good friend?” Will you?
     
  3. Jananikrithsan

    Jananikrithsan Gold IL'ite

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    Dear Sridhar,
    That is a real intense topic which you seem to have handled with ease. Kudos to you.
    Platonic relationships are always looked at with doubt, I fail to understand why? It seems perfectly normal to me that a women and a man are friends and men in my opinion are very trustworthy.I have had many male friends and been equally comfortable in that friendship as with the women.Can I say that it always depends on the way you look at it and handle it.If you or the male friend gives any misleading ideas then both of you should be blamed.
    But is also depends on the outlook of the family, like many of my friends had serious affairs but at home would play the role of the homely girl, whereas I was always open to such freinds. It works both ways, trust and respect play an important role too. There is a very thin line dividing platonic frindship , relationships and to tread on it carefully you will have a buddy for life. It is tight rope walking definitely, but well worth it if you know your limits.
     
  4. Malathijagan

    Malathijagan Silver IL'ite

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    Dear Sridhar,
    I liked the last sentence! How we are always used to taking everything for granted whether in life or in abbreviations or anything else for that matter!This writeup of yours has indeed given me a lesson on how we should not jump into conclusions. Ofcourse, I didn' start reading this for your title! As I have always been reading most of your posts, the same way, I was drawn towards this too.
    Here I would like to share one incident in my life. In those days when internet connections were for the previliged few, I was one among them. I used to chat a lot with strangers with the intention of making friends. Of course I never had the intention of meeting any one since that was a new experience and I didn't want to risk my marraige with some unpleasant experiences. Even then there were some good people who genuinely sought to interact for friendship alone. I had two friends who were males and they used to chata lot. They made me believe that they were gentlemen. In those days I was so innocent that I gave my phone number to them! Horror of all horrors, I get a phone call, one from Germany and one from Pune! The man from Pune wanted to know if I would like to join him for a ball in Adyar Gate (that was the name of Park Sheraton in those days)! And he fully knew that I was a married woman with 2 kids! That ended my rendezvous with net chatters!
    Only after I became a member of Indusladies, did I feel safe enough to communicate!
    This writeup of yours does show your sincerity of friendship towards the opposite sex.
    Regards,
    Malathi
     
  5. Shanvy

    Shanvy IL Hall of Fame

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    Sridhar,

    Going by the style of your titles for the past few thread's I did not even think for a second it was about a girl friend but more on good friend.

    Once my son when he was 6, came home crying from play, because a few of his playmates started teasing about being friendly with a girl. I explained to him that a friend is first a friend and then comes the girl or boy gender aspects...but it set me thinking, what makes children of 6/10 years think in terms of bf or gf, is it the way their parents look, or it is the way the society looks.

    Once a relative had come home. I was chatting with one of veda friend. he is more closer to me. she said "How come you are chatting with veda's friend. and why should u..." .My God the perspective of the relative and her open accusation shook me for a second. I called up veda immediately..he told me, when I know what my wife is, why are you worried about what others say..it is only our mutual opinion that counts.

    These two examples are only to show how a GF and BF is looked at.
    I have very close friends of the other gender. I feel, as janani says there is a very small line which keeps the demarcation.

    Well to sum up I would like to be your GF. And beware, that I treat friends next to God, but without any expectations.

    Read somewhere about platonic relationship.. Man is quite capable of having a women as friend and the vice versa, but to preserve that friendship, you need to have a slight physical antipathy towards each other...but i don't fully buy the thought..

    Let me also wait for others views...
     
  6. varalotti

    varalotti IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Janani,

    It was even more intense the way I wrote it first. I have taken away a lot so as not to overwhelm the ILites. Depending on the interest shown to this thread, I will post Will you be my GF 2, 3.... a la HE or SHE.

    In a way it is right that the relationships are looked upon with doubt. That makes us extra careful. That makes us to search deep within ourselves for any hidden agenda and get rid of it.
    As you rightly said there is only a very thin line and the presence of suspicious looks of the society will guard us against crossing that thin line.

    And if it is embarrassing to our partners, we should abstain from such friendships. My DW knows about all my women friends. She has absolute trust with me.

    Osho repeatedly says that male and female being the opposite poles, we have a lot to learn from each other. In fact I will go one step ahead and say that having a friend from the opposite sex will make you understand your spouse better.

    Thanks Janani for being the first to respond. I think it was because of the haunting song, Anbu Nadamadum Kalaikkodame!

    thanks once again,
    sridhar
     
  7. Arunarc

    Arunarc Moderator Staff Member IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Varalotti
    The write up was mostly more on girlfriend side....
    Male or female having good friends is important. From childhood was thought to respect friendship. So never had problems but very selective in making friends.
    As got married my DH to was the same he never had problem with me having friends of opposite sex. It depends upon how we handle friends. Yes I agree now a days people think single means avaliable. And even if a female is above 40 guys think she is available. There are very few who takes friendship purely.
    Malspie had started a thread is having male friends bad?? or friends of any age......
    It was a good one.
    But here it is having a girl friend or a good friend. Before people use to have friends of oppoiste sex but use to not feel free to speak to them openly but now things have changed. We all have friends of opposite sex.
    In case a person hide about opposite sex friends from her/ his spouse then there might be something fishy about it.
    I agree here itself in IL we interact with so many people male and female but all of us are friendly and good friends to. This site is a best example for good friendship.
     
  8. Nandshyam

    Nandshyam IL Hall of Fame

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    Nice writeup, Sir!! I thoroughly enjoyed the post.

    I am going to re-invent the wheel as mostly everyone has said what needs to be said :mrgreen:

    The confusion, issues popsup only when either one party tries to or atleast thinks to take it to the next level. As long as you maintain the friendship as you would with your same sex friends, there shouldnt be any problem.

    But I guess very rarely we see that.. love starts with friendship they say.. so thats where the problem is... I guess age plays a very important factor when it comes to opposite sex friendship.

    I dont think its wise to have such friends when your harmones are working fulltime ;) I guess a successful, mature relationship can happen only when harmones take a back seat and your mind the driver;s :)
     
  9. varalotti

    varalotti IL Hall of Fame

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    Dear Malathi,

    Thanks for the confidence reposed in me and in my writings. I was appalled to read about your "net friends". Well, before finding one right friend, its worth stumbling over a million wrong ones.

    You will be surprised to know that I too had my share of "wrong friends". Way back in 2000 I got two very good friends through the net (I have written about them all in "The other women in my life" For ready reference please go to my index) Those days I was busy counselling and was also counselled by these good friends.

    A lady from salem whom I had met in a chat room was about to become my friend. We exchanged telephone numbers and were about to commence talking. She did not have a mobile and gave her land line number. She told me that when she picked up the phone she will give a particular signal. But if anybody else picked up I should disconnect. I never called that lady. For I did not want to have any clandestine dealings in a pure, platonic friendship. I belong to the pretty old school of thought - justice should not only be done but also seem to have been done.

    Indusladies.com is the safest haven for real friends who do not have a hidden agenda. And if the proposed membership privileges are implemented it will be safer still as it is always the new member who sends an obscene pm to the members.

    That is one problem with men. They look out predominantly for sex. I tested this theory a few months ago. I registered myself in a website that deals mostly with pictures of movie stars. I registered under a woman's name and declared that I was a woman. You know how many soliciting emails I got from the male members of the site? My God! The invitations came in all shapes and sizes - lewd, decent, vulgar, everything. The central theme was the same. When can we meet and have fun!

    I ran away from the site like mad. Thats the world outside for you.

    I talked about the confidence the ladies have in me. One lady went to the extreme... I'll post the details of her pm here in this thread.

    regards
     
  10. varalotti

    varalotti IL Hall of Fame

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    Shanthi,

    As my GF (good friend) you have really added colour to this thread by telling about your son and your friendship with Veda Vyasan's friend. You have also raised a very interesting issue about the need for a physical antipathy to sustain a platonic relationship. I agree with you that it is not necessary to have that built in safety-valve to sustain a good friendship.

    At the same time we need to have some kind of an internal regulator. In my case I had many. One, I did not have active women friends till I almost touched 40. Two, in almost all the cases the friends are not here in my place. The friendship is through mails and calls and we meet hardly once a year.

    All said and done the physical features distract us. But on a call or a mail, you are talking to the person without that distraction.

    Another safety feature we should have is that the friendship should not be possessive. A possessive friendship soon degenerates into an affair. Once of my friends got a job in a place where another of my friends live. I sent mails to both of them and made them meet there. They became very close friends from then on.

    I am planning to extend discussion on this topic and look forward to your participation (and of course Veda Vyasan's too).

    regards,
     

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