They could be themselves with each other.

Oh, I had been in love. Even if unrequitedly. Love, as I imagined it, went far beyond the clinical technicalities of sex or the games of manipulation. The mundane details of the world disappeared when one person, and one person alone, could center both your sensuality and your sense of meaning, purpose, and beauty, blending them together. It made anything seem possible, anything seem tolerable, and all worthwhile.

LOIS BY CORA CRUZ 34THPARALLEL MAGAZINE ISSUE 30

Lois Mandelbaum had frizzy hair. The paper she read at the seminar was brilliant.

In the clearest possible language, without a trace of pretension or jargon, she led the class through every detail and nuance of Kant’s notion of aesthetic judgment: reviewing and intertwining his versions of reason and morality throughout, you felt you were being led by the hand of the gentlest kindergarten teacher through the thorniest labyrinth of conceptual obfuscation. The structure remained immense, intimidatingly complex and intricate, b…