A few years ago, a college friend called me on my birthday. He’d been feeling, he said, a little isolated — not lonely exactly, but cut off. His work life had shifted, most of his colleagues were younger, and the jokes and comments he’d make in Zoom meetings and on Slack weren’t landing the way he’d hoped. In at least one case, an offhand remark he delivered during a Microsoft Teams meeting inspired a concerned email from HR. He needed, he said, a safe space. People his own age. People who would get it.

He suggested a book club.