That's a place no one talks about; it lives outside the gossip columns and the afternoon talk shows. Let's face it, when you're happy you're not freaking out, so you're really not like anyone else. When people are frightened, they are all alike. But when people are happy, they blossom into whatever particular flower they were meant to be. More than unique because it's the two of you coming together. That's what makes it love -- that it's unrepeatable and unique. Masturbating is just the same thing over and over. That can be good for what it's worth. But lovemaking is in the here and now, and that makes time stop: just the two of you wandering in your own secret garden where no one else is allowed in.

So that's what was happening that day. And she starts coming and I start coming. And it goes on and on. I shout. My neighbor's dog starts barking. There's a cloud out there, kind of turning. And she turns her face up to me and smiles with her eyes.

Read No. 12

Private Life Romance, relationships, and the personal side of Table Talk