Tribute to Angela Risi: 'I thought we were going to be friends for a long time'
Angela was a good friend, both in that I considered her a close friend and in that she was good at being a friend. She cared about friendship and community. Part of why we connected was that, I think, we were both very extroverted and thrived on connection. Being in my second year and in the depths of my thesis work while she was in her first year, I didn’t get to see her as much as I wanted to. I remember her saying she felt isolated because people had so little time to spend together. I deeply related to that sentiment, feeling that our current culture is often deeply isolating. One thing I loved most about Angela is that, in opposition to this, she was constantly cultivating community. Very quickly after getting to Durham, she knew a lot of people. Rather than staying in a grad school bubble, she had friends from all over the Durham community. We ended up with local friends in common, strengthening my feeling that we were kin.