My new best friend

Have you ever met someone, or even just seen them speak or seen them on TV, and wished you could be their new best friend? Bright, witty, razor sharp, they just seem brighter, wittier and sharper than everyone you know? Life, with them as your shiney new bosom friend, would just be that much better?

The idea of the freebie 5 is well known - that you get 5 famous people you 'allowed' to sleep with and your spouse can't object (well accepted too, given the percent likelihood of actually meeting, let alone doing the deed with someone on your list is somewhat less than 0.000001% - unless, apparently, Ryan Philippe is on your list). The ultimate dinner party notion -which 5 people, living or dead, would you invite to dinner? - is pretty ubiquitous too. But this is a deeper connection. It's not just cheap sex with Brad Pitt or a chat over Oysters Rockefeller with Sigmund Freud.

You see, I want Malcolm Gladwell to be my new best friend.

I saw him speak at school, I've read his books, his blog and his articles. I have marveled at his prose and at his hair.

Simply, I love him.

He's so much smarter and more articulate than me, it's startling. Startling too that I don't hate him for it - usually people who are smarter or more articulate than me are just evil.

I haven't told my real-life best friend about my new best friendship with Malcolm. I think she'd be jealous, no matter how much I assured that the New Yorker articles mean nothing to me. It's a tricky thing, rejection for an imaginary relationship. My feelings for Malcolm are real and deep and complex. It's not a crush exactly, nothing sexual underlies it. I just want to hang out with him and listen to him talk for a few more hours or, you know, forever.