I have decided to name you Slave,” I said, looking at my mother. “And your name is Stupid,” I told my father.

His words made me wonder what else might be prewired in my brain. Did we have multiple personalities all wired up and ready to use, just as “emotional vision” was always latent in my mind, waiting for activation?

That was the definition of management – getting others to do your work for you. And we were the others.

The world is full of friendly people with no technical skills.

Here’s a good rule of thumb: Your own rituals are okay as long as they don’t interfere with your responsibilities in daily life, or make you the subject of teasing or ridicule. Rituals become a problem whenever they prevent you from doing the stuff you’re supposed to do, or when they get you in trouble.

It was that time of the night when most of the drunks were already home in bed. The crickets were done chirping, and the birds weren’t ready to herald sunrise.

By the time I was twelve, I had progressed from “If he doesn’t get better, he may have to be institutionalized” to “He’s a weird, screwed-up kid.

When I act politely, I build a reserve of goodwill in others. That reserve allows those people to cut me some slack when I do something annoying.

The hard part was living the contrast between being rich and being broke. It was like being smart, and waking up one day to find yourself dumb as a rock, but able to remember your former brains.

I would make my own war movie for trick-or-treaters, one in which they would be the stars.