Clustered on the high-functioning end of the autism spectrum, “Aspies’’ are “predetermined individualists,’’ Page writes, “people both condemned and liberated to live in our own worlds.’’ Though they tend to share specific areas of expertise their impaired communication skills can lead to some unintentionally comical scenarios. One Aspie devoted to antique piano recordings and another fascinated by the inner workings of vacuum cleaners, writes the author, would surely produce “two uncomprehending and increasingly agitated monologues.’’
Drawn from a “Personal History’’ piece that ran in the New Yorker, Page’s trim, amiably fussy memoir seeks a place on the fast-growing shelf of literature and popular culture concerned with Asperger’s, from Temple Grandin’s books and John Elder Robison’s best-selling “Look Me in the Eye’’ to the recent film “Adam.’’
Page’s New Yorker story detailed his deep-seated quirks, such as his youthful habit of wearing a rabbit’s foot in each buttonhole of his shirt, or the fact that he “made love like the Tin Man until well into adulthood.’’ (Many Aspies struggle mightily with human contact.) His memoir, which expands on the piece, doesn’t fixate so much on the syndrome. Instead, he recounts an adolescence and coming-of-age in which, like so many kids, he felt distinctly “other.’’
Some of his story is extraordinary. As an aspiring filmmaker, using Super 8 film and his siblings and classmates as cast members, the precocious, prepubescent Page became the subject of a short documentary, “A Day With Timmy Page,’’ which won dozens of festival awards.
Some of it is more mundane, such as his drinking-and-drugging exploits with the misfits of Storrs, Conn., the college town where the teenage Page learned to love Pink Floyd alongside Enrico Caruso. He taught himself to recognize the social cues of acquaintances - again, a serious problem for Aspies - by reading Emily Post’s “Etiquette.’’
