On Eros Love in Friendship

 I've been thinking lately about love, specifically Eros love, in friendships. Last year I read an article by Tara Isabella Burton, an author I really esteem, about this topic, and just now a few days ago I finally read through The Four Loves by C.S. Lewis. Recent talks with friends and my wife too have encouraged me to desire and think differently about the types of relationships I have with those whom I choose to love Platonically (in an original sense) and I've been more honest with myself and others in expressing that what I crave most in intimate personal relationships is physical touch. I love hugging, I love kissing, I love caressing and holding my friends' heads on my shoulders, as well as resting my head on theirs as we talk about questions or problems, or just as we watch a movie together. I love sharing my bed with friends, embarking on new projects with them, I even love (in a way) having somewhat-heated discussions about plans or ideas for solving joint problems.

Never before had I thought about it this way, but all my life, my best platonic relationships have involved some sort of Eros, a passionate type of love related to the erotic and sensual, but that is also bursting with creative "life energy" and which wholly encompasses one's entire sexual experiences. However, I don't (always) want sexual relationships with friends, but Eros love can still manifest itself in other ways. If we take erotic to mean something more than just meaning to sexually arouse, but to arouse in general - the senses, the intellect, the spirit - and sensual as not just a form of touch meant to stimulate lust, but to stimulate affection, intimacy and excitement - passionate excitement even, as when an artist becomes obsessed with their work - we can see how that "creative, life-giving energy" becomes manifest in Eros friendship.

Obviously, Eros is not quite fully at home in my Platonic friendships. As a husband, I crave to have a more fully realized Eros relationship with my wife, for instance. With her, that passion and excitement for life-giving energy and sexuality have a place inside our shared home, which is why we are romantic partners. The main difference I can discern so far between 'romantic' and 'platonic' Eros in my experience is that, for my wife and I, our primary goal is to raise children and give them a home (which I'm not implying should be the goal of all romantic partnerships), whereas with my friends I mostly want to share experiences or ideas, to travel or make projects together, offer an ear and words of affection whenever they need them, offer a space of trust to unashamedly be ourselves, and to share life in intimate ways that are nonetheless different from those with my wife and children. But I'm not convinced it's even possible for me to have that without reaching out physically every so often for a hug, lending an ear or shoulder, giving gifts or offering to cook for them every so often, for instance.

My first 'real' friendship, I would say, first happened when I went to high school, and met a bunch of nerdy guys, among whom there was someone I learned so much from. I loved to visit his place, loved to spend cozy afternoons in bed watching YouTube videos or series with him, loved to spend hours discussing nerdy things at the mall, felt comfortable being naked in front of him, and so many times wished I could kiss him again and again, although I restrained from it because it wasn't sexual attraction I was feeling, but just admitting to such a desire would be seen as "gay" or "weird" or at the very least send some confusing message to my friend who identifies as bisexual. So that is just something I've never done, because after a few years we both went to college and stopped seeing each other as often, and I was too mixed up in new friendships and attending classes to reach out intentionally and nourish that love which still is very much alive but somehow less intense as during those school years.

I developed a new very intimate friendship with my best friend from college. We often recorded music together and discussed techniques, made dumb inside jokes, spent long nights playing Mario Kart together; so, so, so often shared the same bed - so often, in fact, he practically became a member of our household. Again, we shared a group of friends but our relationship was special, and people often confused us for one another. I've seldom been happier than in those types of relationships, but at the time I did not see their incredible value for what it was in terms of Eros. Slowly but surely, I decided to pursue other things outside of music, since I did not want to make a career out of that, and if you know of my history with depression, that's also the time when the longest bout began.

I found myself in Germany one semester, falling in love with my future wife. I went back to Mexico to finish my final two years of studies, bid farewell to everyone and everything as soon as I could, no longer standing having to live in the city I grew up in, and promised my friends we would still have each other over long-distance communication. I boarded that plane three years ago and have lived in Bonn ever since. - Here I have two very close friends now, but it's been a considerable effort to locate what was missing in my life and living through long quarantine times made me feel the distance from other bodies so much more acutely. - Maybe that's what I needed to realize what I was missing? Perhaps.

But now, as I write this, I'm crying because I miss my friends from Mexico, and because one of my close friends in Bonn is moving away in a few weeks. The other one still does not know what her long-term plan is, but it also doesn't necessarily involve staying in Bonn, which of course makes sense.

Friendships can be so much more fractured in an age and social class where moving away for love, for work, or for self-realization is by far more the norm than the exception, and while I emphatically do not regret moving away from home to be with my wife, it's made my existing friendships back at home feel less concrete and made a part of me feel like I've betrayed something sacred and I am sorry. What I did wasn't wrong, of course, but it's taken me these six years and a pandemic to see how much I miss and crave my friends' warm bodies and kind voices, and seeing them now online just feels like a pale and artificial replacement for a human connection.

Of course, in those six years they and I too have moved on with our lives. We still tell each other we love each other, which we do, and we're always so happy to see one another when we get the chance. But they, like I, also have romantic life-partners now. Both of my best friends are now engaged and I am just recently married. I still go visit them, but our visits are much more "formal" - meeting for dinner, catching up with what's happening in our lives, maybe play a board game or watch something on the TV, both of us with our spouses. But that natural and spontaneous Eros has a difficult time rearing its head now; I suspect precisely because of a sense that our spouses now "hold" the key and lock to that fountain of Eros, and - especially in cases where a certain sexual tension could theoretically exist, as with my bisexual friend perhaps - sharing it would be, maybe, immodest. For some it might even feel dangerous, I think.

But I'm trying to rethink those categories and be more open about Eros and physical touch in my friendships, thankfully and reassuringly with encouragement from my wife and a close friend I've made in the last few months (shout-out to Pia, if you ever read this!) - As I always f*cking do, I've been keenly looking out for music that relates to whatever is going on in my head right now, like a kind of meditation I can play again and again on loop.

Two songs by The Innocence Mission have been on my mind, one less and one very much. The first I do like, but it's not much of a catchy tune. Still, a song by a married woman talking about how she loves another man who is her friend feels like a welcome relief from all the many (great but repetitive) songs dedicated to romantic love.

Click this link if the embedding is messed up.

The second has quickly become one of my favorite songs of all time. It's one of those that I've kept for days on repeat, learning its words by heart, listening to its message over and over again, thinking of myself and my beloved friends in those verses and feeling swept up by those guitars and drums.

Click this link if the embedding is messed up.

See you all whenever I write something down on this blog next.

P.S. Two more songs are on my mind that didn't quite meet the cut for this article but which are nonetheless about quiet love (the first) and friendship (the second). The first is Green Bus by The Innocence Mission yet again. The second one is Color in your Cheeks by The Mountain Goats.