In those early years in New York when I was a stranger in a big city it was the companionship and later friendship which I was offered in the Linnean Society that was the most important thing in my life.
In December 1998 I considered myself an expert on love. I was almost a year into a relationship one that had grown more slowly than I had wished but once it flowered it was much more stimulating than any marriage or relationship I had known.
