It is my deep and very honouring privilege to introduce to
you all to a dear, dear friend of mine and Marijke’s, who will be joining us in
writing for this (as of yet) unimpressive blagh. Believe it or not, he has featured on this blog
before, albeit anonymously – in my post about Roskilde.
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| OMG THERE HE IS (on the left) |
I would say he's larger-than-life, but the phrase is not suited. Adam is better than life. He’s
cooler than life, and a deeply loving, trustworthy, and loyal friend.
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| Awwwh. |
I start with this picture for its portrayal of our
friendship – not only in that it’s undeniably adorable, but because it captures
an aspect of our relationship which is rather peculiar; we’re on the way to the
train station. In the ca. ten years of our friendship, nine of them have been
spent living in a different country from each other. Our meetings always end
with one of us escorting the other to the train station or airport before
spending another half year or so apart until we are fated to see each other
again. It’s hard to characterize a friendship with so little actual
interaction, and I will surely fail if attempt to, but I'm going to try to anyway.
It started, strangely enough, around the time that Adam
moved to Milan.
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| My impression of Milan |
We made friends at the age of 11 or so (no photographic evidence
remains of this strange and distant time) in my aforementioned oil baron &
co. international school in Oslo, before Adam moved to that hot pile of smog
that is Milan (forgive my unrelenting bias against that city, it’s all Adam’s
fault!). Looking back on the years that followed this development, I went to
visit Adam a surprising amount considering our relatively short
prior friendship (other friends of mine moved and were forgotten – such is the
life of the international school kid). Over the years, our friendship grew into some
semblance of a brotherhood, forged between awkward individuals of an age where
we realised that people did not function in the ways we might have understood
or joined along in – whether this separation from the rest was perceived or
real, I do not know, but our shared feelings of social discomfort blanketed us
in a paradoxically soothing, and warming way. Out of this I think our
friendship grew, always, because even when things were unshakeably ‘off,’ Adam
was in Milan, and things were ‘off’ for him too, and if that is so then it is
not we that are ‘off,’ but everything else, because we could share it.
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| Like a litter of puppies we were. |
But before this turns any more soppy than this wine-soaked tirade
of ‘for-he’s-a-jolly-good-fellow’-ing and Keroacian ‘brothers against the world,’
I think I’ll keep it simple and introduce you to a few facts about our Adam,
with what few photos I could find of him (being part Vampire, he is hard to capture on film).
He’s a massively dependable guy – not only as corner stone
of a human pyramid (bottom left), but more importantly as a friend. He is
totally trustworthy not to screw you over, in any way, shape, or form, be that
by cock-blockage (unless needed), beer-blockage (ever!) or ditchage in the
middle of the night while you stumble around the coat room of the bar looking
for your scarf which you know is somewhere because you still have the little
tag but everything is thrown all over – he will lumber back inside like some
great benevolent bear and search as if possessed until you find that fucker. He will also do your dishes and cook you food when staying at your
place because he is a ninja and is learnéd in the ways of the food-fu. He also
plays a mean electrical guitar.
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| Lord High as fuck. |
Related: he is well-dressed (like the scholar and gentleman
that he is), and owns a helmet that says ‘Dick’ on it, which he uses to butt
his way through crowds or otherwise defend his head from the unseen enemies
that he claims always watch from the shadows.
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| Don't be one. |
He is a huge fan of
the Science-Fiction genre and has read all the classic writers like Isaac
Asimov,
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| Mmyes, robots. |
and Iain M. Banks,
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| Rest in peace sir. |
after which my knowledge of
sci-fi authors fails, but he knows them all and generally holds a fascination
for all things futuristic.
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| Yup. |
As a result of his love of books (I guess), he studied English
Literature at university from which he has recently graduated:
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| Bringin' da NOISE. |
He now spends his days as a post-graduate (or, as he prefers to call
it, ‘being unemployed’) waiting for his breakthrough in the literary world, muttering
to himself and making odd sounds with his belly.
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| What's that you say, Adam's Belly? |
Oh, and he’s English. Here’s a picture of him with a tree.
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| Adam assures me that the expression he is wearing is one of joy for the flowers, but I have my doubts. |
