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A few weeks ago, I woke up to the usual barrage of deep-thought, big-picture, late-evening Slack messages about user onboarding from Ian Stewart, and I couldn’t help but notice something… Ian looked different.

I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. Was his hair grayer? No, it’d always been pretty gray. Were his eyes beadier? No, they’d always… The job had clearly taken its toll on him, he seemed to be lacking his usual depth and detail. But he somehow seemed more approachable and friendly.

All kidding aside, I hate when Ian reminds me that on top of being a world-class product lead, WordPress theme OG, prolific reader, generally snazzy dresser, and a stereotypically friendly Canadian, he also has artistic skills to boot (said with some Canadian raising). So I did what any enterprising guy would do, and immediately tried to piggyback off of his talent.

Honestly, I thought he’d just laugh me off and we’d awkwardly never talk about it again. It was understandable. It was his cool new thing, done with his cool new iPad, and any typical cool kid would just hoard that cool new skill to themselves and make people jealous for months. But Ian’s a friendly guy, remember? And I’m good at asking for things politely. So with a little constant hounding…

That’s right. The hair. The glasses. The chin. Even that a-hole smirk. Perfection. Right down to the coolest detail.

What’s more, is that I’m pretty sure he drew it in the ~1hr window between me demanding and him delivering. Like “sure – just leave me alone.” And now I’m left with all these feelings that I don’t know how to deal with. “Why were you so mean about asking? Why didn’t you just let it go after he laughed you off? How can you repay him for this? You don’t have anything to offer. Does he really think of you as a friend? This is what friends do. Did he already have this on his iPad? What other Cain art does he have? Does he keep a little shrine to Cain in his basement? Are Meredith and Orvis safe?”

I hope he doesn’t hate me for writing this, because it’s actually meant to be an awkward Cain-esque thank you. I really like my new avatar, Ian. You’re an okay guy.