When I was a young man I was lost in the world, overwhelmed by the choices that radiated outward in all directions from the ground I stood upon. Strange as it seemed to me then, it was the freedom that I had that held me inert in a kind of silent confusion. I could not decided if I wanted to be this or that – famous or mundane – and so I was neither.

I remember standing on the dock my father had built over the pond on his farm, dropping stones into the water – stones I had collected while out walking in the fields and forests. The wind was strong that day and blew in from the west, creating small waves that moved persistently over the water and blew the leaves and flotsam over to the far side cove. I dropped a stone into the water and focused on the splash and listened to the deep thunk as it submerged. Somewhere inside this activity I noticed that the rings I expected to see radiating out in concentric circles from the point of the stones’ splashdown were deformed into ellipses by the overwhelming current of the wind.

My mind grew quiet as I watched, cycling into the meditation of an unrecognized trance induced by a half-felt, half-intuited realization on the edge of understanding. I remember an intense sense that what I was watching meant something more than the purely physical movement of liquids and forces. The water in the pond was murky, like some dark abyss. In it, I was looking inward as I stared outward.

I was neither famous or mundane – I was known to friends, family and those in the neighborhood. I’d never been on television or saved someone’s life. I’d never done anything of significance that would have elevated me to the exhalation of fame. I was just another commoner – a peasant – with my name neither conjuring up notions of heroism or shame. Most people were like me and seemed to enjoy the bond of neutral anonymity we all shared in our country exile.

There were rare exceptions amongst us – there were the famous and also the infamous. Eddie was the latter. It was not really his fault as he had been born autistic and his actions were therefore outside of the bounds of the norms of behavior that the community expected of its citizens. His was a life that inspired rumors, gossip and fear. His name was a synonym for Satan or Rasputin. He was troubled.