I was once neighbors with a well-known musician. I’m not saying his name as I’m not trying to bash the guy. I didn’t know or listen to his music, but I knew of his name when I heard it. I didn’t know what he looked like though, so the first time I saw him I didn’t know who he was. But I felt something about him was unusual.

I got in the elevator headed down one day, and the musician was already on it. He was wearing a loud, attention-grabbing outfit. Had an interesting hairstyle. Shades so dark that you couldn’t see his eyes behind them. I could tell from his face behind the glasses that he was young. And he had this little dog, who was seated on a circular pillow. The whole presentation just looked funny.

I spoke to him and said Hello. He replied, but his voice was so quiet I couldn’t even hear him speaking back to me. He didn’t turn his head towards me when he spoke, just stared straight ahead. There was nothing logically crazy about him. It was just his energy — something wasn’t natural about this guy.

I saw him a few more times in the building, always in the elevator as I’d seen him the first time. It was only after a security guard in the building asked me if I’d seen _______ (musician’s name) that I googled the name and realized this was the same peculiar elevator rider I’d seen a few times.

There were a lot of known people who lived in the area that I’d see often. Mostly basketball players and musicians — there were probably others, but those are the ones I could easily identify. All of the known names I’d see had their own natural, human styles.

This one guy though, the musician — if I had to describe him, it just felt like he was playing up a caricature of a famous person.

For Your Game

I told you this musician looked young; when I looked him up I learned that he was young— he was a teen at the time. I think he was living out what he thought a famous person was supposed to be, which meant wearing shades indoors, not speaking to people, and wearing attention-grabbing clothing. All of which was a cover-up for… something he was lacking. There were several things.