Why am I eagerly awaiting Robert’s explanation on how to differentiate schizophrenics from patients with amphetamine-induced psychosis. What about this 360 pixel resolution (this is what a video filmed from inside Robert’s nostril would have for quality) lecture on possibly outdated research from 14 years ago enraptures me so much it could be the most exclusive screening of an Oscar-winning film making its debut. 

Despite Robert being hundreds of kilometers away from me, over a decade in the past, speaking an academic language I have never heard, I still feel like a child at a toy store when scouring his youtube playlist.

But this experience with Robert is quite familiar to me. In middle-school I would read about the production of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and watch late-night Kurzgezagt videos on cellular respiration (highly recommend these by the way; those guys are absolute class). I honestly could not have cared less about biology at the time and was more concerned with the dramatically serious engagement party I was throwing with my fiancée, and the latest developments on which school football team we were facing next. But the gleam in Scott Phillip’s eyes during our Tuesday 10:20 to 11:50 Integrated Sciences class was so delicious that he could have convinced me to pursue a PhD in Scientology. 

My reaction to his effortless poise was so visceral that at thirteen years of age I would write dozens of horrifyingly pretentious pages on the details of the Krebs Cycle in hopes of being engulfed in the unbridled fragrance of life he exuded. When my English teacher (Olive!) spoke of Seamus Heaney, the room would turn to grass, my classmates and I became spades and potatoes and danced around in a thick Irish air of heritage. I only ever read in hopes of tasting her experience, the depth of the immersion she fostered in all of us. 

In Robert, Olive, Scott, the Kings Cross performer between escalators linking the Piccadilly line to the Northern, there was this common criminal radiance. Even those who spoke of ideas I found deeply uninteresting, or made music that did not particularly appeal to me, when holding this gleam, would cupid me into a lifelong adoration of their passions. They exuded something intangible, evoked a feeling akin to recalling a forgotten dish. Our attempt for The Neighbor is to create a map precisely for this kind of experience, and carve out from the endless noise a tiny fraction of unbridled beauty.