friendship as the center

Rarely in our day-to-day lives do we get so excited that we are crying with our best friends, grabbing each other by the shoulders as we jump up and down with glitter on our faces screaming “WOOOOO!!!!!” Instead, we are that man in the subway: This is not a concert, we are riding the train, we are on our way to work, and that requires a certain dec... See more

So, as I was saying, I was swimming by the cliffs. Every day, walking up and down the coast I found new places to dive in. I got interested in high diving—something I had been too much of a coward to do as a kid. I felt a childish excitement for water. The kids on the beach would look at me, whisper, and laugh. That is one of the pleasures of youth... See more

The late historian Alan Bray, who wrote books both on homosexuality and on friendship put this eloquently: “The inability to conceive of relationships in other than sexual terms says something of contemporary poverty