My best friend's wedding

I have just returned from a beautiful, satisfying trip to Delhi. Attended a wedding in Gurgaon. One of my very close friends was geting married. I didn't realize just how close she was to me until I clicked a photograph in the Gurudwara...a second after she was wedded to the person she was in love with.

I expected to go to the wedding to build memories, have fun, share joy, and hopefully not embarass myself too much (charging towards the buffet, shoving people aside can be unseemly). I did not expect the lurch in the heart and the lump in my throat, though. There she sat, resplendent in a fine outfit in violet and gold - all poised and regal next to the groom. Very oddly, I remembered an evening a year ago. We'd gone running in the park, and it had started raining. We ran anyway. She giggled like a child in the gushing downpour. Soaked to the bones, we went to buy spinach. On the way back, there was a shattering bolt of lightning and a deep rumble of thunder. And what did we do? We went to a small, musty grocery store and had kairi ice-candy.

That my friend is beautiful, is an understatement. But as a bride, she literally...literally...took one's breath away. And through this solemn, peaceful composure - that only comes from a certainty of knowing that you're doing the right thing - I clicked a girl who sat dripping next to me one evening, with ice-candy in her hands and magic in her smile.