Oh. My. Life. So that's a term? Radical hospitality? A flash of recognition/understanding has gone off in my head! I'm a musician/promoter/club night & cabaret venue creator (brought up by a Nanna) and in recent years I've been so influenced by reading Dancing in the Streets: a History of Collective Joy, by Barbara Ehrenreich. After reading that, I've been determined to make more opportunities for the creation of Collective Joy (which Babs says is vital for a functioning society - for many of the reasons you talk about). I created a show/communal pot-luck night called The Get-Together in my area (South Devon), which was a big hit and was packed. I gave people comedy name badges that broke the ice and prompted conversations before the show. I invited people to bring quality finger-food to share. I extended the interval so that people could natter and connect. The gig included a kind of PowerPoint where I talked (comedically) about Collective Joy and the need for it, the physical/mental benefits of connection etc. It went off. The food-sharing, the hubbub, the conviviality! After the show was over, the audience gave the band a standing ovation. One woman grabbed my shoulders and shouted in my face: "We need more of this". I envisaged the Get-Together as less a gig, more of a touring social club where people (and the band!) would dine together, chat, connect. A hoedown! A multi-generational village-hall knees-up! So much more than a binary gig where the audience 'sit there' and look at the band 'up there' whilst they do two miserly 45-minute sets before exiting backstage and packing the van... I'm a half-black, American-born soul/jazz/blues/gospel-influenced singer and I was thinking about the travelling tent shows Bessie Smith used to do across The South. I had all these hopes and I knew there was the appetite for my Get-Togethers, let alone the social scenarios of disconnection, atomisation, a 'loneliness epidemic'. Then Covid. After lockdowns subsided, I tried again, but something had shifted and people were far more stay-at-home. It never fully took off again. But I'm not defeated! I've got a small but growing audience on Patreon and I'm trying to offer my backers there more value in the form of meet-ups and a music book club - underpinned by my mission to make more Collective Joy (for social good, not just for hedonist reasons!). I'm also interested in befriending, although that's a very unformed idea at the moment. Frances Northrop's LinkedIn post led me to your Substack, by the way, and I'm so looking forward to reading and hearing more about your work, which is inspiring me further. Thanks very much for inviting stories and conversation around this topic.