Have I changed?

A friend of mine read one of my posts and emailed me asking if it was my blog, meaning she says she couldnt believe, it was me. More than being amazed, I should say puzzled. She feels "I have changed".

Have I changed? If I have, is it for the better or worse?

Here goes an analysis...

As far as I know of me during my school days, I used to be a very serious kid. Was very punctual to school, never took leave, more studious than I could ever imagine myself to be, as against my bro who was the most laid-back person one could ever see. Despite my dad's constant pressure on both of us with the you-gotto-study-hard thing,  he didnt yield a bit. Though I so envied him, I still kept studying hard(What a loser I had been :).  I was given certificates during the annual day, and I remember once when my uncle and aunt came to cheer me. ...And once when my name was called on stage, my dad stood up and waved/whistled, which badly embarrassed me :).

I had this best friend of mine and spent most of the time in school with her, so much so that others at school, including our teachers believed that we were cousins(Seems silly now, but we used to enjoy all the on-the-spot-lies we blurted and the cover-ups that followed). The highlight was our stay-overs. Stay-overs were not for having fun back then, they were for studying and we really used to study hard. We took turns to stay-over at each others' place and I had a tough time convincing my dad to agree for stay-overs. I used to wait for lunch/dinner time at her place. Her mom is a great cook and you can dare to have any amount of study hours just to have a taste of her food. We had this prefect system in school and both of us were prefects like 4 times for our respective "houses" or "alayas". In fact I was the captain in 5th grade(which happened by chance, because the original captain mis-behaved). I still remember the day when we(all prefects) were admonished by the principal at her room and we(atleast I) started crying :). The major disadvantage of being a prefect was that for anything bad that the class did, you were held responsible. And with it came a lot of other work too,  the reason why I changed my school fearing my teachers would make me contest in the elections and I wouldnt be able concentrate in my studies. How silly I had been!  I had this neighbor of mine, whose mom used to force to study with me, as she thought her son would improve if he studied with me. But what did he do? Flirt with my friends in the name of studying. Did he improve in his academics? Not that I can think of!

Thus went my school-life, with me being very obedient(to my dad and at school) and sincere. One thing I was yearning to have then, was freedom. I didnt wanna be dictated all the time and wanted to live my life on my own terms, most importantly, didnt want to be kept-a-watch-on all the time. So I decided irrespective of the marks/colleges I got in Chennai, I was gonna go out of town to do my college. Fortunately my marks were decent enough to earn me seats in reasonably good colleges in Chennai as well as govt colleges, and I preferred the latter, for the sole reason of going out of Chennai.

Going to college was a giant leap for me. It was a big change and the most precious 4 years in my entire life. If I was asked to re-live any particular part of my life, it would surely be those days. Be it at home or outside I really evolved as a better individual. My mom/dad/bro, whose value I hardly knew when I used to stay at home, somehow suddenly became the most loved people and my love for them grew exponentially, the more I missed them. I never took them for granted anymore and waited to visit them. Does it mean college sucked, so I was waiting to visit home? 

No way....watch out for more on this....