Comment by tibbar

Important context is that the author was a social outcast as a child. I also had this experience, and I can tell you, I was just desperate to figure out how to get people to like me. It wasn't that I wanted to manipulate them, I just really, really wanted to have friends and be included. And so I also cycled through different tricks that I thought would help. (I went through a standup comedy phase, for instance.)

Of course, in many ways making friends is all much easier than either I or the author was making it out to be. But I suspect we were both burdened with some unrealized oddities, and, unable to directly identify or compensate for them, sought other, more elaborate ways to fit in.