At a nude beach on the Adriatic Sea, my friend and I saw a man who sparked a competition between us. When one of us stared at him, the other’s eyes followed.

“Love amid apocalyptic urban debris, love amid pimps and drug pushers, love on staircases scattered with used needles … can barely pay the rent.” This was not an atypical note to find myself jotting down in my early twenties, part of a scribb…