hello everyone. there is a book or story that i very vaguely remember, and I’m wondering if any of you might recognize it.

what I remember is that it’s about a young boy. for some reason I feel like there’s something specific about him - like, maybe he was a black kid? or he was ‘odd’, acted strangely (maybe autistic?), something I wasn’t able to really pick up on as a kid but recognized as a Thing. I think he was either adopted, fostered, or just taken in by a different family.

one of the most prominent things I remember about the book is that he was really good at untying knots, and there was something about The Biggest Knot in the World or something. 

i remember a scene where he had mashed potatoes (for the first time?) and thought they looked a lot like clouds, and I cant remember if he enjoyed them or if they kinda fucked him up for some reason, like he just got really into the whole ‘they’re clouds’ thing and it made him feel weird…?

there was also an ‘other side of the tracks’, like a bad side of town, and it’s another thing that makes me vaguely think it had something to do with race. there was a man, homeless i think, who ended up befriending the kid. i cant remember anything they did or talked about, but i feel like… something sad happened. or maybe i was just sad ‘cause the man was an older, homeless character, and he was gruff but nice. i cant remember if something bad happens to him but for some reason ‘bittersweet’ is a word that i feel describes the story well. 

that’s a really weird little assortment of vague details but any of y’all know what tf im talkin’ about? i feel like i read this either For school or just In school, idk if it was required reading. Woulda been sometime in late elementary or very early middle school, probably.