Use and Throw

The mid to late 1990’s saw the advent of the “use and throw” era as far as the product market was concerned. This could be seen in the increasing number of such type of ball pens where one didn’t have to buy a refill. Extensive market research showed that the primary users of ball pens, students, had concrete reasons to get attracted to such a concept. Students, like me, were liable to be careless and lose a ball pen just days after its purchase, so it made sense to offer them a single time use pen at a lower cost than a refill-able pen at an obviously higher cost.
But that’s just the tip of the ice-berg when we talk about the use and throw concept, the reason being that this “path breaking” concept can well be applied to relationships as well.
Let us consider the first relationship that an individual gets into outside his circle of family members – friendship. Now aren’t we choosy when we make friends? Damn right we are. It has to be someone who makes us laugh, someone we can trust with our house key when we are out on vacation, someone we can pour our heart out to in case of certain “exigencies”, the latter being a common thing during the growing up age of adolescence and puberty, and just after an year or so into our marriage. So, its not a selfless motive that makes us choose friends – social acceptance is the technical term for it. So, while it is social acceptance that makes us seek out friends, it’s the potential of a good time that we might have in their company that makes us keep them. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? Not quite, not yet.
In today’s age of networking websites and the related net-based software applications, social acceptance is not that hard to buy. The internet provides even the introverts among us to let their hair down and gain access into circles that they might otherwise have had second, third or fourth thoughts about. Further, growing and easier access to movies and other literary works allows even those without an inborn talent at humour to be able to pass off wise cracks with relative ease. So, the pool of people one can choose to have a friend from is much wider and broader and deeper than it was a couple of decades ago. Hence, one always keeps on meeting newer people (newer, hence more mystical, and hence more interesting). And it’s easy, as mentioned earlier, to approach anyone and sweet talk for a couple of hours and get the initial access at a “friendship”.
But then, the honeymoon period gets over real fast, say, in a couple of months, or in case of individuals who continue to live in a state of self-denial about having chosen the wrong person to talk to in the first place, even more time to cut away those strings that connected him/her to “that amazing person”. And hence, what you get is a “use and throw” friend, made especially for those among us who are careless enough to choose the wrong person to make friends with.
But what if the “cutting off” isn’t mutual? Problems, you think?? Nah!! Isn’t Man the most mature of all animals? He may miss the other person, shed a few silent tears as well, but a few days, weeks or months later, depending on His maturity levels, He will be back on the social e-network, seeking out newer individuals, and cracking the same old wisecracks all over again to gain attention.

NOTE: "He,His,Him" etc refer to both the sexes, and in certain cases, the third sex as well!!