My friends wouldn’t have a platform to deliver a poignant speech about how we met, but they could show me how much they cared in other ways: checking in during their coffee breaks when I’m upset over a racist encounter, surreptitiously leaving a Polaroid of a moody Halifax sunset on my desk because it reminds them of me, an invitation to go for a quiet walk on the beach or simply to sit in the kitchen with them while they bake an apple pie because there’s a whisper of fall in the air. Being surrounded by great people isn’t a fluke. It’s almost like solving a math problem, finding variables,
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