II I FOUND MY MAC LIPSTICK THAT HAS BEEN MISSING FOR A YEAR || IN OTHER NEWS ... ||
First, thank you all for the lovely comments you left on my last two LJ posts -- I will indeed be answering them, but couldn't make a new post without acknowledging you all and expressing my gratitude that you took the time to initiate a little exchange with me.
It's especially nice because you know what? I've been feeling quite lonely for the past two months or so. Do any of you ever experience this -- feeling lonely? My situation is that I am a firm introvert and a moderate loner, even though I don't want to be a loner. I have always enjoyed having a small, but intimate, group of friends -- I would rather have one or two close friends than 20 acquaintances with whom I could never share my deepest thoughts. In a mixed group, I typically keep my mouth shut, my ears open, and don't contribute a lot to the conversation until I feel comfortable enough with the group to put myself out there. I tend to be sardonic, which often goes over peoples' heads and they think I'm being snarky or rude (I try to watch this very carefully), but even so, I realize that even my closest friends don't always like this trait of mine, so I am extra careful to not always be sarcastic or sardonic. I have been known to occasionally blurt out something completely inappropriate, that I meant as humor, but comes across like an ACME anvil to the head. I know I am not without flaws.
I've made some attempts over the years to connect to other people. I remember when my kids were young, I would take them to dance or tumbling classes, and invariably I would end up on one side of the bleachers while all the other moms congregated at the other end, chatting, and laughing, and having a good time. I volunteered at my kids' preschool for several years and was even picked as the parent liaison to represent the preschool on the church's board (very liberaly United Methodist Church, in case anyone is wondering) and I enjoyed that for a good while, but I didn't meet anyone. This time I think it had to do with an age gap -- mostly everyone else was 20+ years older than I was at the time.
When I went back to work I made some very excellent friends at the office, the kind of friends I thought I would never find again. We liked the same activities, music, dancing, books, etc. When I left probation in 2010, those friendships disappeared. LOL, I complained about this to my therapist. "They dumped me! They didn't even call or email or anything!" To which he raised an eyebrow and asked, "Well, did you call them?" No, no I didn't. Mea culpa. I don't expect people to always come to me, but it is hard for me to reach out to even a best friend -- I easily feel intrusive and like I'm interrupting someone when they'd rather be alone. Hence my tendency to wait for the other person to make the first connection. It was poignant, but just recently I deleted them all from my phone, as it has been three years and I like to keep a neat and organized up-to-date contacts list on my phone, and that felt very final and made me sad. I will always cherish them, even if they don't cherish me. Sometimes that's the way it is.
Recently, I checked out Meetup. Denver has 325 groups. I am too old for most of the social groups (WTF?). Here's some that could be relevant:
- Dealing with Social Anxiety Disorder, anxiety, depression, and loneliness ... I don't really want to try and alleviate my loneliness by discussing loneliness; I'm already in therapy, for crying out loud!
- Women with Chronic Pain ... I would want to know more about this. I don't like being stuck in a room where everyone's telling war stories and trying to one-up each other with "My pain is worse than YOUR pain because ..."
- Women, Food, and God using the book of the same name by Geneen Roth ... I don't connect to spirituality-based programs because I'm agnostic on the best of days, and I cannot run screaming from the 12 steps fast enough.
- Mom's Wine Club ... I don't really drink wine often and I'm not overly curious about it. Plus, I should avoid alcohol with the meds I'm on.
- Girl Geeks Dinner ... I was excited about this one; unfortunately it's for programmers, not, like, SciFi or Fantasy geeks.
Okay, so I'll continue to check back periodically and see if any new groups of interest pop up.
I have one more idea for making connections and will plan to try put it into action tomorrow.
I really do sorely miss having a group of friends. But enough about that.
----
We got a new piano:
My mother actually bought it for us, even thought I told her over and again that she didn't have to do that, that we could pay for the piano. But she insisted. She said she felt badly that she had been the one to find our former piano (the Victorian upright we had at the other house, that ended up needing to be restrung, which is a few thousands dollars, so not worth it) and encouraged us to buy it. I thought this was very lovely of her. DD is taking piano lessons and now she can practice every day instead of 1-2x per week. Perhaps in the process I will learn how to read music at long last.
I usually don't like different shades of wood close together, but the tone of the woods in the dining room work together and I don't think it looks too bad. It's a Baldwin spinnett-style piano. I just have to arrange to get it tuned.
It's especially nice because you know what? I've been feeling quite lonely for the past two months or so. Do any of you ever experience this -- feeling lonely? My situation is that I am a firm introvert and a moderate loner, even though I don't want to be a loner. I have always enjoyed having a small, but intimate, group of friends -- I would rather have one or two close friends than 20 acquaintances with whom I could never share my deepest thoughts. In a mixed group, I typically keep my mouth shut, my ears open, and don't contribute a lot to the conversation until I feel comfortable enough with the group to put myself out there. I tend to be sardonic, which often goes over peoples' heads and they think I'm being snarky or rude (I try to watch this very carefully), but even so, I realize that even my closest friends don't always like this trait of mine, so I am extra careful to not always be sarcastic or sardonic. I have been known to occasionally blurt out something completely inappropriate, that I meant as humor, but comes across like an ACME anvil to the head. I know I am not without flaws.
I've made some attempts over the years to connect to other people. I remember when my kids were young, I would take them to dance or tumbling classes, and invariably I would end up on one side of the bleachers while all the other moms congregated at the other end, chatting, and laughing, and having a good time. I volunteered at my kids' preschool for several years and was even picked as the parent liaison to represent the preschool on the church's board (very liberaly United Methodist Church, in case anyone is wondering) and I enjoyed that for a good while, but I didn't meet anyone. This time I think it had to do with an age gap -- mostly everyone else was 20+ years older than I was at the time.
When I went back to work I made some very excellent friends at the office, the kind of friends I thought I would never find again. We liked the same activities, music, dancing, books, etc. When I left probation in 2010, those friendships disappeared. LOL, I complained about this to my therapist. "They dumped me! They didn't even call or email or anything!" To which he raised an eyebrow and asked, "Well, did you call them?" No, no I didn't. Mea culpa. I don't expect people to always come to me, but it is hard for me to reach out to even a best friend -- I easily feel intrusive and like I'm interrupting someone when they'd rather be alone. Hence my tendency to wait for the other person to make the first connection. It was poignant, but just recently I deleted them all from my phone, as it has been three years and I like to keep a neat and organized up-to-date contacts list on my phone, and that felt very final and made me sad. I will always cherish them, even if they don't cherish me. Sometimes that's the way it is.
Recently, I checked out Meetup. Denver has 325 groups. I am too old for most of the social groups (WTF?). Here's some that could be relevant:
- Dealing with Social Anxiety Disorder, anxiety, depression, and loneliness ... I don't really want to try and alleviate my loneliness by discussing loneliness; I'm already in therapy, for crying out loud!
- Women with Chronic Pain ... I would want to know more about this. I don't like being stuck in a room where everyone's telling war stories and trying to one-up each other with "My pain is worse than YOUR pain because ..."
- Women, Food, and God using the book of the same name by Geneen Roth ... I don't connect to spirituality-based programs because I'm agnostic on the best of days, and I cannot run screaming from the 12 steps fast enough.
- Mom's Wine Club ... I don't really drink wine often and I'm not overly curious about it. Plus, I should avoid alcohol with the meds I'm on.
- Girl Geeks Dinner ... I was excited about this one; unfortunately it's for programmers, not, like, SciFi or Fantasy geeks.
Okay, so I'll continue to check back periodically and see if any new groups of interest pop up.
I have one more idea for making connections and will plan to try put it into action tomorrow.
I really do sorely miss having a group of friends. But enough about that.
----
We got a new piano:
My mother actually bought it for us, even thought I told her over and again that she didn't have to do that, that we could pay for the piano. But she insisted. She said she felt badly that she had been the one to find our former piano (the Victorian upright we had at the other house, that ended up needing to be restrung, which is a few thousands dollars, so not worth it) and encouraged us to buy it. I thought this was very lovely of her. DD is taking piano lessons and now she can practice every day instead of 1-2x per week. Perhaps in the process I will learn how to read music at long last.
I usually don't like different shades of wood close together, but the tone of the woods in the dining room work together and I don't think it looks too bad. It's a Baldwin spinnett-style piano. I just have to arrange to get it tuned.