#friendship

#friendship

From the 1950s until his death in 1987, Hujar documented the creative lodestars of downtown New York, many of whom were his friends, lovers, or sometimes both. He photographed the likes of Susan Sontag and John Waters stretched in repose, or the Warholian legend Candy Darling, encircled by flowers and solemn chiaroscuro on her deathbed. He often photographed himself, too, but the rarest shots of Hujar are those taken by others, candid glimpses that divulge some secret relation.

Matt and I started from the same place. Same middle-class neighborhood, same public schools, same dreams of making it big someday. We'd spend hours in his garage talking about the companies we'd build, the problems we'd solve, the money we'd make. The difference? He actually did it. Last month, I scrolled through Instagram and saw him closing on his third investment property. Three months before that, it was the Tesla. Six months before that, the startup exit that set him up for life.

The Crown Bard in Rhyl had always been there, on the main road on the way out of town. Despite living a five-minute walk away, I don't remember ever going there in my teens, but I must've passed it thousands of times. Local wisdom dictated it was where the rugby lads drank, while the pub directly opposite was where you'd find the football crowd.

"I've had to sort of mourn in a way, not the loss of those friendships, but like how they've changed," Moore said.

Alan was my best friend, my brother and my everything. I don't stop thinking about him. For me, there's no replacement; I just have a void. If I could speak to him I'd say: Come back, because I can't really bear being without you. We saw each other or spoke every day since 1980. I was a third party in the marriage, but Rima was never jealous.

Translator who broke the rules to become decades-long friend of Guido Nasi tells of their relationship and the lives destroyed by one brutal act

Dear Eric: I recently pet-sat for somewhat new friends. I had been invited on a weekend trip with them but had a work commitment that meant I couldn't go. I offered to pet-sit for them, which is something I've done for other friends from time to time. During the weekend there was an incident which wasn't really anyone's fault that resulted in some minor property damage. I let them know via text what happened and explained the situation and offered to cover any damages.

Ein Freund, ein guter Freund, ist das Beste was es gibt auf der Welt [A friend, a good friend, is the best thing you can have in this world].―The Comedian Harmonists I dedicate this essay to my friend Gerhard Almstedt, who was taken from us in 2023. Friendship is an underappreciated topic in psychological research, although having good friends is one of the cornerstones of a successful and rewarding social life. It is a source of happiness (Pezirkianidis et al., 2023).

Two best friends in Alabama became pregnant with twins and triplets at the same time. Their shared experience of parenting multiples created a strong support system for both families. Living close together, they help each other manage the challenges of raising five young children. This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation Madison Knight. It has been edited for length and clarity.

Dozens of women who considered me their gay best friend sounded great until it was time to exchange presents with all of them during the holidays. I was too cheap to buy all my friends expensive Christmas gifts but too classy to give them something, well, cheap. I had also grown tired of spending $50 on something pointless in bulk, usually a criminally overpriced novelty item.

A journey is best measured in friends, rather than miles, as travel writer Tim Cahill said. As a Pacific Northwest writer who frequently travels to Canada, I couldn't agree more. Living barely an hour south of the Canadian border, I've had the pleasure of hopping the 49th parallel countless times. The real magic of crossing that line is not just the immediate sense of spaciousness, but the feeling of a familiar, open-hearted welcome.

Dictators like to move people around. Stalin, for instance. From the summer of 1941 through the fall of 1942, with the Russian front facing massive bombardment and Nazi troops on the ground, he decided to relocate civilians, and entire industries, to safer regions in the eastern Soviet Union. The Urals, Siberia, the middle Volga, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan eventually received sixteen million evacuees, perhaps the most ever moved across land by a single directive.

The friendship breakup has become a feature of modern life: Online, advice abounds on "how to aggressively confront, or even abandon, friends who disappoint us," Olga noted. But what if another solution exists? Instead of firing your friends, psychologists told her, it helps to expand your circle, allowing more people to provide you with different types of support or camaraderie: "Rather than resting on one pillar, healthy friendship is better imagined as crowd-surfing-many hands holding you up," Olga writes.

I was 28 and fed up with the dating scene. Swiping had become a ritual of ghosting, small talk, and scheduling conflicts. I work in business development for a US law firm in Hong Kong and was chasing a promotion, so it was easy to tell myself romance could wait. Then, one night, a casual scroll on Instagram inspired me to try something different.

We had similar jobs when I started six years ago. During that time, I've had two big promotions, and she has stayed where she is. Her work is well-received, and she always gets positive reviews, so she's frustrated she hasn't been promoted. She asked me to help her figure out what is going on. (When asked, her supervisor didn't give a straight answer, which is typical here.) I think the problem may be how she presents herself. She dresses within the letter of the dress code but more casual than those around her. She takes personal calls within earshot of others and will pop in and out of the office to run errands or pick up her kids from somewhere, and then work from home to make up the time. While technically it is allowed, others don't do this. Only 10% of our job is client-facing, but looking and acting the part is noticed.

A decade ago it was whitewater rafting, ropes courses, and ziplines. This time, to mark a milestone birthday, three longtime friends - Ben, Brice, and I - set our sights on the Great Allegheny Passage (GAP), 150 miles of crushed-limestone rail trail threading the Appalachians from Cumberland, Maryland, to Pittsburgh. Ben (a college housemate), sidelined by bad discs, volunteered for logistics and to turn his 2020 Toyota Sienna into a makeshift SAG wagon.