In "mem"orium..

Give goss....These simple words have sustained me through five years of law school...

....through hours of boring lectures, when "give goss" scribbled on the back of the notebook produced reams of information, bitching, "personality anecdotes", and quite often fits of giggling.

...through dead evenings right after project submissions and mid-term exams when the next set of deadlines were far away and there was nothing to do....

....as opening line of conversation aimed solely at eliciting information about/ not- so- subtly discussing the object of one's affections....

....through 5-minute coffee breaks in the middle of exams/project submissions, which turned into hours long bonding session on everything and her boyfriend

.....through dull internships when office time and internet connectivity were productively used to hook onto the grapevine.....

...through the first few months after law school when we were still in regular touch chatting or on the phone and when every conversation began not with a "wassup" but with a "give goss", and there was goss to give...

lately though, the anticipation behind the words has dulled into dreary routine...I still start conversations with close friends with a "give goss". this elicits one of two responses:

1. Me: " Hey dude! give goss"
Friend: No goss yaa. U tell.
Me: No goss here also yaa.
F: Then wassup?
Me: Nothing. U tell
F: Nothing
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2. Me: Hey dude! Give goss
F: X(or Y or Z, generally X and Y, or X and Z, or...u get the picture) is/are getting married!!
Me: Oh ok. then wassup?
(to confess, since I have been in position of the said X (or Y or Z, actually X and Y) I cant really complain about this, bit what the hell its my blog.
F: Nothing.
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Is it because we are getting older and wiser and more mature and therefore less excited about things that were previously deemed goss-worthy? Are we all running out of things to say? are we, as Mem opines, settling into routines where the daily grind takes so much out of us that we dont have time for the little "frivolous' pleasures of life? or is it because we are out of the claustrophobic environment of law school which at once repelled (most "give goss" session generally degenerated into general law school cribbing) and attracted us (most law schoolites I know, including me, suffer from "law school exceptionalism" - we believe we have been through an exceptional experience that no other campus can match, that unique bonds have been created here that others cant understand...we even have our own lingo and our own codes...i know from experience that in a gathering of law schoolites most non-law schoolites feel excluded and uncomfortable...)....but back to the larger point- have we grown up and out of that world that so definitely shaped who we were and who we have become??

Whatever may be the cause the demise of give goss from my life has definitely "left a void" (quoting TA - ah the number of goss and giggle sessions this particular phrase inspired!:-)) which is difficult to fill...it was such an important part of the law school experience that from amongst all the small little things that defined college, this continues to be one of the most painful to say farewell to.