I sat, attempting to sift through a random stack of Normal client files like indistinguishable pins in a box.
How is it that I can so often and intensely resort to putting myself through such fruitless motions?
Could I be any more aware that my Method works regardless of whatever identifying specifics I seem so hell-bent on pinpointing?
Besides, I suspect my Normal numbers will soon dwindle even more.
Ray’s words rolled through and crested over in my mind like sets of swirling waves as I continued to reshuffle crumpled pages which might as well have been blank.
We will certainly be returning to the cryptic after-work activity Ray mentioned having always felt the need to lie about.
Yet what piqued my interest today was what I will refer to, I suppose, as Ray’s appraisal of popular art in society.
One statement in particular that arrested my attention was how “art turns normal into just another perfect character…”
My mental picture was of those responsible for creating the most significant cultural and commercial works spending fortunes on acquiring something of an accurate spec on what could be considered most common or mainstream.
An example would be the statistics used to plan out an appeal so it draws as large an audience as possible; knowledge of what is currently seen as most ordinary would be immensely valuable in assuring the greatest return on such an investment.
Yet then as I continued to patter around the shapeless edges of my paper pile, Ray’s words suddenly came to touch on a concept far more personal and relevant to me than either art or advertising—it was an instant, deep connection, like a steep and unseen underwater drop out in the surf.
I immediately became enraged at myself for having missed it earlier, while Ray was here.
In contemplating how specific “characters” Ray described might fit within my scheme of Normals and Outliers, I realized his rulers (the “eaters”) would obviously be the wealthy who never come to me for fear of having their secrets exposed.
And Ray’s slaves (the “food”), of course, would be my Normals.
Yet my moment of illumination came as soon as my mind or Method took its next inevitable step.
Since both slaves and rulers are characters, are there any non-characters?
Is anyone not part of Ray’s city?
I then instantly recognized my own thoughts as they occurred, like seeing old friends approach my door from far away; for they were the same thoughts I had been preoccupied by already scouring aimlessly through the jumbled mess before me—the same thoughts I always have.
My interest in Outliers is really a search for the exact same thing.
My Outliers would be non-characters in Ray’s world.
My mind spun with the similarities, leaving me with the eeriest of feelings as if I were somehow thinking Ray’s thoughts for him, in his absence, perhaps after having heard his unique perspective put forth so often in recent sessions.
Yet the sensation of thinking for Ray also somehow felt not strange at all, but bizarrely . . . right.
Why am I so fixated on those not part of the system?
Yet I have indeed always known exactly why.
As I sit, day by day, racking my tired brain against so relentless a siege of formless, practically interchangeable individuals, what I am actually searching for are even the slightest of Outlier traits—any qualities that might shift a client away from the center enough to make them identifiable.
It was as though my Method had used Ray’s words to lock my mind in sync and bring me to a sort of miniature Sticking or Breaking Point, myself.
How ironic.
Ironically ironic.
I wrote the following on the back of some form whichever Normal had long ago filled out and signed:
Normals feel no need to question their place in the world or how things are.
So are Outliers non-characters because they are too aware of societal conventions (consciously or unconsciously) to take part?
Yet even as my worn mind continued to reel and assemble what would have amounted outwardly to further hurried jots, my surge toward triumphant breakthrough was interrupted by a pesky little man who barged into my office unannounced and sat down across from me in a huff.
My day’s appointments long-finished, I sensed myself becoming livid.
I considered quietly tapping the Security button beneath my desk so as to have the wee man forcefully removed.
Yet then, I reasoned, he might be waiting for me out in the parking lot later with a blade drawn (or likely two to equalize his stature).
I decided to at least determine the nature of this interruption, which seemed too perfect in its unfortunate timing to be accidental.
ME:
“Can I help you?”
STRANGER:
“Yeah. See, I woke up, and was with this weird bunch of people on a raft.”
Even though I was still thinking of (or . . . as) Ray when the stranger spoke, it took a moment for me to register and make the connection.
ME:
“What?!”
Of course the probability of two potential clients informing me about awaking to separate raft scenarios seemed infinitesimally small.
Besides, I knew at least Ray’s raft could not be literal.
I tend not to notice things like variations in facial features, though the stranger was clearly far older, stouter, and lighter-skinned than Ray.
Yet I could tell the stranger was indeed an Outlier just from his presumptuous entrance and the curious confidence tingeing his outré opening remark.
At least Outliers are easy to pick out.
STRANGER:
“Yeah, there were twelve of us, so I knew it was probably because of Astrology. I picked that up even before I got everyone’s birthday. But once I got the dates, I made little mental charts, and found that all the twelve suns, moons, and ascendants were represented there on the raft! But no one would take me seriously! I tried to show them! It was so obvious! How unlikely . . . with exactly twelve people?!”
I had no idea.
His words sounded to me like grating, faux-epic gibberish.
ME:
“You tell me.”
ASTROLOGER:
“Freaking impossible! We must have been there for a reason, somehow! But—”
ME:
“Wait, how could you tell that the, um . . . that all the combinations were there on the raft?”
ASTROLOGER:
“Well, when I asked for birthdates, of course that should have made the sun signs clear to everyone right away. We were all born about a month apart. But I also know all the moons and ascendants by heart.”
Something about the ever-so-slight grin this supposed client seemed to want to always wear struck me as deeply suspicious.
ME:
“What are sun signs, moons, and ascendants?”
His answer came draped in tones of condescension.
ASTROLOGER:
“Well, the moon moves between signs . . . certain star constellations . . . every few days. And the ascendant changes all day, every couple hours; it’s also called the rising. So, I just know them all from seeing people’s charts for so many years. I get to know their personalities, and I see the connections, so it’s really easy for me to remember the dates. That’s all.”
ME:
“How many years are we talking about?”
ASTROLOGER:
“Well, the oldest on the raft was 50.”
It occurred to me that it might be beneficial at some point to have this odd little man in with Ray for a joint session.
Could this be some elaborate trick or setup?
My current diagnosis: The astrologer most probably has a condition similar to what textbooks call synesthesia, which enables him to remember an almost infinite number of dates and times by naturally associating each figure with a specific feature or behavior seen.
Those with the likes of synesthesia make all sorts of unusual connections between various aspects, allowing huge amounts of data to be recalled.
But with astrology, there should be no reason for birthdates to correlate with actual observed characteristics; so I will need to consider this one some more, assuming the astrologer is genuine (and pays to become a client).
How could astrology literally be true?
It makes no objective sense.
And then we come to just moments ago as I sat to compose these notes, when two ideas occurred to me right away.
First, I am ready to outright marvel at the fact that, in the space of one day, I was carried through Christianity’s backdoor deals with mainstream art and thrust into astrology as it worked to arrange individuals on yet another raft.
Such is the life, I supposed, of one infatuated with Outliers.
Yet do they also seem to somehow seek me out?
Anyway, my second realization was that as soon as I switched from shuffling old client files to developing and refining these new detailed notes, a deep-seated feeling of useless, wasted effort was immediately jettisoned and reversed.
It was like seeing a misplaced, frustrated worker being slipped over into a more ideal role where they can experience all new levels of reached potential and satisfaction.
In other words, I could appreciate just how good and right it feels to be doing this right now.
I don't know anything 