When you listen to Jo Strogatz talk, you hear the wide-open world inside the brain of a young 20-something. And you also hear the uncertainties of the life ahead of her.
"In college, I spent a long time trying to date people, convincing myself that I was happy doing it and not finding people that were actually a match for me," she said.
Strogatz was pondering questions relatable to many people her age: What do I want out of a romantic relationship? Is this person the one for me? Do I want to be dating at all?
After graduating with a degree in psychology and music from Tufts University last year, Strogatz moved to Portland, Maine, to continue her education at the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies.
There, she enrolled in a podcasting class that led her to explore these questions further: "I started wondering if there's somebody out there — there had to be — who felt fulfilled by their friendships and maybe their sex life. But not in the traditional path we think of."
As she searched for that person and shaped her story, Strogatz met Steve Small — her mom's friend's friend. "Steve is in his 60s. He's a great conversationalist and listener, and he's fit and he makes really good banana bread," Strogatz narrates in her podcast.
Her conversations with Small, she said, changed her perspective on love, romance and friendships.
He became the main character in Just Friends, the grand-prize winner of this year's NPR College Podcast Challenge.
NPR visited Strogatz in Portland to learn more about her winning entry, selected from hundreds of podcasts from around the United States.
"Friendships are a hundred times more important"
As it touches on love and friendship, Just Friends also shares personal details of Small's life: how living through the 1980s AIDS epidemic in New York City shaped his identity as a gay man, how failing relationships around him showed there were alternatives to traditional romance, and how he found love within.
Small tells Strogatz in the podcast that he has been single his whole adult life. And he says he's truly happy that way.
"I only know my life the way that it has been," he says. "My friendships are a hundred times more important to me. My friendships are the closest thing I have to a marriage."
Using music to tell the story
Strogatz, a musician, singer and composer, told us that in her interviews with Small, she didn't hear just his life story — she heard something else.
"The way that he told his story felt like music to me," she said. "And it made me realize that storytelling can be music."
Strogatz composed her own original songs for Just Friends and said she considers the music a character in the story — a tour guide to Small's life journey.
That original score was one of many things our judges found so compelling.
"Jo's story, music and voice held my interest from the very beginning," said Ailsa Chang, a host of NPR's All Things Considered and one of this year's judges. "I've lived most of my adult life with friendships being my most intimate relationships in life, and so I related easily to how [Steve] found love, trust and intimacy in nontraditional ways."
Strogatz excitedly walked us through five pieces of music she created for Just Friends. To help listeners travel back in time to Small's teenage years, she made use of the upright bass, as well as her own voice, to create sounds that capture the absurdity of puberty.
To demonstrate, Strogatz pulled out her phone and played a video of herself in front of a piano. In the video, she listened to Small's interview out loud and composed music simultaneously over his voice:
"It was how Steve's words inspired the music and also how they made me feel."
Redefining happiness in adulthood
With her blue-framed winning certificate in hand, Strogatz traveled with NPR from Portland an hour south to Newmarket, N.H., to visit Small.
Small greeted Strogatz with a warm hug, complimenting her chunky charm necklace and congratulating her for the big prize. They sat down on a couch in the corner of a cozy cafe, where Small once worked as a teenager and built lifelong friendships.
Small said people often ask him whether he is still single, often with a tilt of the head and a pitying tone.
"Single suits me," he explained. "I have never woken up and thought, 'My life is not complete because I'm single.' And I can't say that somebody couldn't come in and knock my socks off five years from now, but it hasn't happened yet."
Strogatz told Small that interviewing him, and creating her podcast, has changed her outlook on relationships. She said she would still someday love to get married and raise a family, but for now, she's taking the pressure off herself to be in a relationship:
"When I find somebody they will be a better match, because I'll know who I am."
Turning to Small, Strogatz said, "You inspire me in the way that you are just completely yourself. You do what you wanna do, and I hope that I live my life like that too."
Small responded simply, "You'll get there."
Jo Strogatz is the grand prize winner of the 2024 NPR College Podcast Challenge. You can listen to her podcast, Just Friends, here.
Wanna enter? The 2025 college contest will reopen in September. You can subscribe to our newsletter for the latest updates.
Copyright 2025 NPR
