Little Brother is 32 today. I was almost three when he was born and I remember feeling fiercely protective towards him. This did not stop me feeding him worms or intentionally whacking him in the head with swingball. We grew up as different as two people can. Physically he got the olive skin, althetic body, natural sporting prowess. I didn’t. I loved school, loved reading and learning. He couldn’t wait to be outside with a ball at his feet. For most of our childhood, we lived at Waikouaiti, near Cherry Farm where our parents worked. We would watch Dad play football on Saturday afternoons in the hospital grounds. One of the patients used to get carried away by the excitment of the game. It was not unknown for him to take his clothes off on the sideline. Occasionally he would masturbate. Mental illness gives you perspective. And both Little Brother and I are both now unembarassable.

At High School, we started to have friends in common. By the time he started Uni we were good mates. We both worked summer jobs at the hospital. I cleaned operating theatres and worked as a kitchen hand. Little Brother mowed lawns (he developed a spectacular cricket green out the back of the psych-geriatric ward). He once left the keys in a tractor to play cricket and a patient drove it into the car park, causing havoc.

As soon as he graduated, he got on a plane to London. I was so proud and envious of his courage to get out of Dunedin and do it on his own. But it wasn’t easy for him. The hedoism of drugs and alcohol meant he was in a bad way for a while. And London can be a shitty, unforgiving place. He came home and sorted his head before he went looking for things he wanted, he travelled to the States and Mexico. Read Hunter S. Thompson, Keraouc, Ginsberg. He found some solace in the words of those writers. We would write long emails to each other about life and literature and stuff.

After Mum’s funeral we sat in the garden, surrounded by Mum’s lovely, mad friends. Iain put his arms around me and told me that everything was going to be ok. He did it again two years later when my marriage became a train wreck. And in spite of his penchant for attracting bunny-boilers, he is now married to a beautiful, warm, funny woman, who is exactly right for him. They have a little girl. We chat often, email, Skype and text. He is the one constant in my life and I cherish him.

But then they danced down the street like dingledodies, and I shambled after as I’ve been doing all my life after people who interest me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn, like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes ‘Awww!’ ~ Kerouac, On the Road, 1957

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