When David Patrick Adams listens to people's life stories, their journeys can resemble the flights of glider pilots. In cross-country races, explained Adams, who is a licensed pilot, competitors sometimes fly in a different direction from their intended target to catch the thermals that will carry them to their destination. The 19th-century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson described a well-lived life in similar terms: "The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens itself to the average tendency." For eight years, Adams, 74, has been chronicling the zigzag lines of people's lives, including their random and serendipitous tangents. After a career of launching many other businesses, his current one involves conducting video interviews of clients and then creating personal documentaries about them, similar to the approach of Ken Burns. But unlike the work of the famed filmmaker, Adams'"portrait interviews," as he calls them, might be seen by only a handful of people — perhaps just family members and close friends — and sometimes not until after their subjects have died. Each "portrait" is like a message in a bottle to future generations. Adams' clients aren't necessarily rich or famous. He's interviewed doctors, lawyers, artists, musicians, farmers, teachers, bankers and entrepreneurs, all of whom are of varying ages and nationalities. What they have in common, he said, are accumulated experiences and insights that they wish to preserve for posterity. Adams' own zigzag journey has taken him across multiple continents. A native of Buenos Aires, Argentina, he was raised in Brazil and educated in Europe before moving to the United States. A lodestar in Adams' life has been an inclination to continually reinvent himself. He's worked in higher education, commercial real estate, advertising, consulting, professional mentoring and philanthropy. In addition to flying planes, he is also an avid horseman and former skydiver and marathon runner. Having "retired" at 50 with financial independence, Adams was motivated by something beyond the accumulation of wealth. "I want to have good conversations with people," he explained in an interview. "The philosopher Martin Buber says, 'All real life is meeting.' I want to engage ... on a deeper level with people because I want to understand what the hell this is all about." Adams agreed to an interview at his wooded hilltop home in Northfield, where he lives with his wife…
When David Patrick Adams listens to people's life stories, their journeys can resemble the flights of glider pilots. In cross-country races, explained Adams, who is a licensed pilot, competitors sometimes fly in a different direction from their intended target to catch the thermals that will carry them to their destination. The 19th-century philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson described a well-lived life in similar terms: "The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens itself to the average tendency." For eight years, Adams, 74, has been chronicling the zigzag lines of people's lives, including their random and serendipitous tangents. After a career of launching many other businesses, his current one involves conducting video interviews of clients and then creating personal documentaries about them, similar to the approach of Ken Burns. But unlike the work of the famed filmmaker, Adams'"portrait interviews," as he calls them, might be seen by only a handful of people — perhaps just family members and close friends — and sometimes not until after their subjects have died. Each "portrait" is like a message in a bottle to future generations. Adams' clients aren't necessarily rich or famous. He's interviewed doctors, lawyers, artists, musicians, farmers, teachers, bankers and entrepreneurs, all of whom are of varying ages and nationalities. What they have in common, he said, are accumulated experiences and insights that they wish to preserve for posterity. Adams' own zigzag journey has taken him across multiple continents. A native of Buenos Aires, Argentina, he was raised in Brazil and educated in Europe before moving to the United States. A lodestar in Adams' life has been an inclination to continually reinvent himself. He's worked in higher education, commercial real estate, advertising, consulting, professional mentoring and philanthropy. In addition to flying planes, he is also an avid horseman and former skydiver and marathon runner. Having "retired" at 50 with financial independence, Adams was motivated by something beyond the accumulation of wealth. "I want to have good conversations with people," he explained in an interview. "The philosopher Martin Buber says, 'All real life is meeting.' I want to engage ... on a deeper level with people because I want to understand what the hell this is all about." Adams agreed to an interview at his wooded hilltop home in Northfield, where he lives with his wife…