Albert Camus wrote to René Char in 1957:

The more I age, the more I find that you can only live with beings who liberate us, who love us with an affection that is as light to bear as it is strong to experience. Life has become too difficult, too bitter, too weakening, for us to suffer more new servitudes from those we love. We would end up succumbing to sorrow, literally, and we have to live to find the words, the impulse, the thought on which to sustain a joy, the joy.
I cannot conceive of our friendship any other way. I adore your happiness, your freedom, in a word: your adventure, and I would like to be a companion you can be sure of, always.

So here’s to the blithe and lasting spirit of friendship… happy 40th birthday, Matt!