My good old friend from eleventh and twelfth grade – Navin Saxena – was in town to drop his son Varun at Emory. I remember seeing Varun in April of 2014 when I was visiting Portland for work. We had all gone out for dinner. Navin let me know today that Varun distinctly remembers me. For a rather unique reason. Apparently, Navin and I had a minor public fracas trying to prevent each other from picking up the dinner tab.

Before that evening, I had seen Navin in April, 1994 when he had come for an interview in Dallas. And before that it was in May, 1986 in his hostel in his Engineering College.

Last time, we had reflected a lot on the past, our school days, our trips together to Dip Sengupta’s house, my house, his house and many of our old friends. Today, we talked about what the future holds for us. He, especially, has been going thru some soul searching given he is a freshly minted empty nester.

It was great to talk about the important things in life over what he called a “chai toast” (We were drinking tea).