Correspondence / 3

First loves are heartbreakers, aren’t they. Has anybody gotten past one unscathed? But then I sometimes 
look back at love I’ve taken for granted, or worse, discarded, and think “what was I thinking?” I 
suspect that if I could go back to the same circumstances and frame of mind I’d remember “oh yeah... 
that’s what I was thinking.”

I was going to say that Justin and NYU were long before we met, forgetting how richly compressed 
those times were: in reality there were only a handful of years separating what seems several narrative 
lifetimes apart. We were busy little shits, weren't we! And every lane in NY was the fast lane. Our 
circles intersected both proximally and intimately, each in its own season. Bill once told me he 
considered you nearly perfect boyfriend material. I had to agree.

I always thought of us as pals, despite your nomadic ways. I knew you could never be tamed, and I 
was OK with that. I sensed and accepted your restlessness. I think you’re way more affectionate by 
nature than I am, and more giving, although on your terms, a kind of hedge against intimacy, a 
reluctance to surrender. I was, and am, OK with that too. In fact, I think that your having maintained 
that measure of personal integrity, as did I, perhaps instinctively avoiding the kind of emotional
entanglement that sages warn against, only kept our friendship safe from harm. There was always the
tender tact between us that is the hallmark of a spiritual bond.

I never felt that you were attracted to me romantically. I know what it's like to be desired, as I'm sure do 
you, and that was never the prevailing vibe that I felt underpinned our interest in one another. I just 
assumed we were birds of a feather in that regard. I think we subtly, but definitively, warned each other 
off pretty early on. Perhaps we sensed that that was the path to a more enduring friendship, a choice we 
made. That did not, however, prevent us from appreciating each others' desirability, the way friends 
can, in the abstract. I knew you were a hottie, and one of the coolest guys ever. Bill once told me that I 
was thought of as a sex object back then. Our hanging out together made heads turn! But not toward 
each other, at least in that way. I think of our one night of eros, the one I remember anyway, that you 
arranged, as a kind of ritual affirmation, a bonding moment, of our friendship. Something that you felt 
"needed to be done." You even put it in those terms, or close to it. Or maybe it was just curiosity. I 
ended up enjoying it more than you did, it seems, despite my initial skepticism. But I enjoyed it for 
what it was... more of a coda than a prelude. We had been friends for some time by then. The fact that 
you didn't remember it when I recounted it to you in New York last year surprised me. I admire that 
you never pretended to. But I'm equally impressed that it happened at all - and that it was on your 
initiative. Have you noticed that no porn in the world can hold a candle to a nice orgasm recalled... 
thanks for that! I like to think that our get together in NY was my matching gift to our friendship. 

I can understand how reminiscing about that night all those years ago, or attempting to, could be seen as 
flirting. For me it was the erotic touchstone, a keepsake, between us that you had so long ago intended 
it to be, but which had never, it was strange to realize, became for you. That said, I’m an incorrigible 
flirt, although that may not be the right word. There are times when for me the right kind of eye contact, 
of assent, is more intimate and gratifying than a toss in the hay, which often strikes me now as 
superfluous. 

I’m so grateful that our friendship endures. That it’s still standing, when so many others have perished, 
strikes me as something of a miracle. You’re my oldest friend from my New York times. 

My truck was laid up for Christmas, so I couldn’t go anywhere, including midnight mass. An outpost of 
all three of the old sacrament-centered churches that I admire - Catholic, Lutheran, and Anglican - are 
clumped together here, and I enjoy them all on different occasions. My brother stayed in Michigan 
(there was a family crisis) for the first time in many years, so I made due with local company, which 
was fine. It’s difficult to explain the unlikely affection one can develop for a truck - I felt bereft! It’s 
good to be on the road again.