"[my name], you have more punk in your little finger than I do in my entire body".

Said to me by my late best friend, who was the punkest dude I have ever had the privilege of knowing — the kind of punk that reminds me to get angry at systemic injustice in the world rather than internalising it all and spiralling. I can't do much to fix the world, but it's good to be angry at the right things.

When someone gives a compliment, the weight of it is determined by a combination of what the compliment-giver values, and the values of the person receiving that compliment. For instance, I deeply value ideological pinkness, and so that compliment hit harder than if I didn't. But even if I didn't especially value punkness, the compliment would've still landed because I knew my friend deeply valued punkness.

Man, I miss the dude. But I carry him with me everywhere I go. I loved him so dearly because at the start of our friendship, he saw aspects of myself that I couldn't see. Knowing him helped me to become who I am today, and it's compliments like this that helped me along the way.