By Samar Verma
When a Friend Leaves Too Soon: The Ache We All Know
A Gentle Tribute to a Departed Friend
In the quiet aftermath of loss, we often search for words that can hold the vastness of what we feel. This reflection is dedicated to Subir Sinha—a school friend, a steadfast companion, a soul affectionately known as Lord Subir—who left us far too soon, this night. Through his story, many of us will recognise echoes of our own cherished friendships: the laughter that spanned decades, the small quirks that made someone irreplaceable, and the lingering ache when time proves unfairly brief. What follows is not just a remembrance of one remarkable man, but a shared meditation on the enduring light that true friends leave behind.
Lord Subir: A Mosaic of Joy That Outlives Time
We all know that quiet hollow when a friend who made life feel richer is suddenly gone. A thought reaches out for their voice, their laugh, their familiar presence—and finds only silence. That shared ache draws us together today as we remember Subir, a man whose spirit was far larger than any one story could ever contain.
I have felt it myself, this bewildering emptiness when a friend leaves too soon. One moment, the world feels full of their unspoken company; the next, it is strangely quieter, as if a favourite song has been turned down forever. Subir’s going reminds me of every friend I have ever lost—the way their absence does not announce itself dramatically, but seeps in through small, ordinary cracks: a joke I want to share, a question I want to ask, a habit I suddenly notice only because they are no longer there to indulge it. We expect grief to be a storm, but often it is this gentle, persistent drizzle that changes the landscape without us noticing at first.
He was not famous in the way the world chases fame. Yet in the ways that truly matter, Subir was unforgettable. He lived with a gentle, unapologetic freedom—true to his own quiet rules, turning everyday moments into small celebrations. With affection and a touch of wonder, we called him Lord Subir, not because he ever demanded it, but because he carried a charming sovereignty: quirky, warm, utterly his own.
Who else would honour a personal code by insisting on chicken without onion or garlic? Who else would joyfully discard the potato from a samosa and savour only the crisp golden shell, as though that alone held life’s secret delight? And who can forget the only person we knew who happily ate rice and daal with potato chips—a simple, mischievous signature that always drew smiles. These were not oddities; they were loving proofs of a singular soul. In memory, they become sacred, reminding us all to live with preference, not apology.
Subir loved good food with generous abandon, good music turned up loud, good company that lingered long into the night. One image glows brightly: him in a car, radio blaring, singing along with pure, unselfconscious triumph—as if every ordinary drive was worth celebrating like a conquest. He needed no grand stage to feel alive; he made the everyday radiant.
We grew up together in a gentler time—no mobile phones constantly pulling us away, no endless screens, no hurried digital lives. Being a friend then meant full presence: long afternoons over chess or homework, unfiltered and immersive. It was the kind of companionship later generations might only imagine—lived in person, without curation or interruption. From those school days of earnest planning for school socials—fussing over clothes, rehearsing lines to impress someone across the hall, then laughing later over the small triumphs and gentle failures that only young friends can truly understand—to later years in Mumbai, Ahmedabad, Ghaziabad—he showed up. In ways we only realise later, we grew into each other—carrying quiet traces of his warmth, his gentle defiance, his delight in the small things, long after we had parted ways for the day.
He had the gift of amplifying joy—celebrating a friend’s success as though it belonged to the entire circle, marking new beginnings with a warmth that made them feel larger and more deserved.
I went to Ahmedabad carrying the preoccupations of a young scholar- work that demanded long hours, sharp focus, and the peculiar solitude that often accompanies a PhD at IIM. In that intense season, Subir did what he always seemed to do for those he cared about: he quietly stitched companionship into my days. He persuaded me to join his company- almost as an extension of friendship itself- so that the city would not remain only a place of deadlines and library lights, but also a place where life could be shared. And when the formalities finally translated into a role and a designation- when I came in as a Management Trainee- his happiness was expansive, almost childlike in its openness. He and his wife, another dear friend, celebrated it not as a career milestone alone, but as if something precious had been secured for all of us: a new beginning, a shared pride, a moment worth marking loudly. That is the kind of friend Subir was- someone who did not merely stand beside you, but who amplified your joy, making your success feel larger, warmer, and somehow more deserved.
The image that keeps glowing is a car radio turned up full blast, Subir singing along with the FM station, singing as if he had climbed Everest- or something even higher. That detail says so much about him. Not a man waiting for grand occasions to feel triumphant. He could turn an ordinary drive into a festival. He could convert the everyday into a declaration: we are alive; this matters; this is worth singing for. And then there were those evenings in Ahmedabad- beautiful, unrepeatable evenings that I now hold like fragile glass. I fell in love with the city, I realise, largely because of him- because he made it warm and full and companionable, because he made it feel less like a place I was merely passing through and more like a place where life was happening. And there was also that constellation of school friends- Shyamal and Deepak in particular- who were there too, turning that chapter into something far richer than it had any right to be.
What has stayed with so many of us, since his passing, is how the same Subir lives distinctly in each friend’s memory—held with equal love, yet for different reasons. He lived differently in each friend’s heart: one saw him as the king of generous joy, devouring sweets as though happiness should come in oversized portions; another as the loyal companion who crossed cities to remain near, attending milestones when few others did; yet another as the quiet guide who opened doors during solitary seasons of study and work, turning unfamiliar places into warm homes. We each carry our own private version of him—proof that a true friend multiplies rather than divides.
Some of us now hold close a final conversation—a rare moment when this quietly strong man spoke of his pain. It reminds us how often the strongest among us carry suffering in silence, and how precious it is when they let the veil slip, even briefly. One friend puts it with tender ache: “He has gone far ahead this time, and made sure only I will follow him there one day.” In that gentle claim lies the depth of bonds that even death cannot fully break.
Even in his final days, when pain was heavy, he still reached out to help others. That effortless generosity was not a habit—it was the very essence of who he was.
Grief arrives in waves, untidy and fierce: affection tangled with disbelief, gratitude colliding with anger at time’s cruel arithmetic. The feelings do not line up neatly—they race, crash, and overtake one another. Tenderness sits beside a stubborn, almost childish refusal to accept that forty-six years with a friend should end before sixty. Laughter at a sudden memory can turn to tears in the same breath. And that chaos, too, is love.
I have learned, through losses of my own, that we are allowed this mess. We are allowed to laugh at a memory one day and feel furious the next. We are allowed to speak their name aloud just to hear it echo, or to stay silent because it hurts too much. There is no correct way to miss someone who shaped so much of who we became.
We are often asked to sum up a life in one neat portrait, one defining theme. But lives like his resist such compression without losing their truth. So we refuse to simplify him. We hold him as he was—many things at once, a mosaic whose every small piece still glitters.
If grief is love searching for its lost address and finding none, then remembrance is building a new home for that love—in the stories we keep telling, the quirks we smile at, the songs we still hear in our heads.
This is not only Subir’s story—it is ours. It echoes every deep friend who has shaped us, every soul who has made ordinary days feel extraordinary. He taught us, gently and joyfully, that life is best lived with preference over conformity, with song over silence, with presence over distance.
So we do not say goodbye. We say thank you—for the laughter, the loyalty, the unmistakable quirks. Thank you for showing us how small choices—how we eat, how we sing, how we care—can make a life truly large.
Lord Subir, your mosaic lives on. In every crisp samosa shell savoured, every radio turned up high, every act of quiet kindness, you remain—vivid, warm, eternal.
We are beginning to miss you, dear friend. And in missing you, we keep your light shining.
