Some people prefer to spend most of their time with friends. Other people prefer to be alone most of the time. Which way of life do you prefer? Use specific reasons to support your answer.

Time spend with the friends can be enjoyable. There is a time to be alone, however, and to think seriously without the input of others. Relaxing alone at home is a good time to think about something important or enjoyable without interference from other people. Also, solitude is an aid to creativity. Many good ideas occur when one sits alone and lets one's mind wander. The result may be valuable new insight. The chemist who worked out the structure of the benzene ring, for example, had that particular idea while sitting in front of a fireplace. Would that idea had occurred to him if he had been sitting with friends in a noisy tavern? At such moments of creativity, company may be the last thing anybody desires. Consider the story of British poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, who composed his famous poem "Kabula Khan" in its entirety in his mind and was ready to put the poem on paper when received and unexpected visitor. The visitor soon departed, but meanwhile Coleridge had forgotten portion of the poem. He was able to recall and record only bits and pieces of it. Those fragments became one of the best-known poems in English. However, what must the original work have been like? We will never know, because an unwanted company distracted the poet as he was about to write it down. Therefore, companionship may have its own benefits, but so does time spent alone; and while group activity may be fun, solitude yields deeper and more lasting rewards.