Hear no emo, see no emo, say no emo

[substitute]

You know that feeling you get when you’ve been with a group of people for a while, and they’re your friends and you see them all the time, and you share things, and you think of them as peers, and then one day you realize that they’re all the group and you’re not one of them?

I get that a lot, probably because my social circle has almost no one like me. And because my daily routine, and the things I like to do, are out of sync for who I’m supposed to be.

I’m forty years old and I have a professional technical career. The people I see around here that are my age are married, have maybe a kid in high school, own property, and are appropriately in the middle period of their lives. Their careers are in full swing and they’re busy with child-raising, working on their houses, working on their marriages.

I live with my mother in the house I grew up in. (To be fair, I lived on my own for years and years, but.) I am unmarried, and I’ve not been on a date for years; I’ve never had a girlfriend. I don’t own anything more than my car. I wear a t-shirt and jeans. I hang out at a coffee house almost every night with people 15 years younger than I. I feel like one of them. I’m interested in the same things, my life pattern is similar, I enjoy their company. But I’m periodically reminded that I’m not one of them. And they move past me. They get engaged and married, buy houses, have kids, move on.

I got stuck at about age 18 and never went past it. It’s nightmarish, like a corny Twilight Zone episode. I was reminded of t this again tonight, predictably, at Trader Joes watching the twentysomething couples buying their groceries together and looking clean and pretty and hip and well-organized and couply. They’re as smart as I am, just as interesting, just as sophisticated and cultured as I like to think I am, and they’re miles ahead of me and only a little over half my age.

And as much as I fool myself from day to day about my social scene, I’m not one of them. Twenty years ago I was with my peers and I was in a place where I belonged. That all moved along and I’m still here.

I can’t stand it. I hate pathetic people like that. Like me, I mean. Like me.

Comments

[kineticfactory.livejournal.com]

I think you may be being a bit hard on yourself. Perhaps your not belonging is only an illusion. You'll be the grand elder of the boho scene, becoming a local legend of sorts, while everybody else moves out and fades away into suburban mundanity.

I've seen people like that in Australia; men of middle age or older, artists, poets and bons vivants, becoming fixtures in the inner city, publishing zines, reading at spoken-word nights, and being the closest thing we urbanites have to tribal elders. A few years ago, one passed away and they put a statue of him up in the hipster precinct of Melbourne.

Anyway, my point is, life is what you make it, and more importantly, how you frame it. If you see the glass as half empty, and yourself as someone who was left behind and does not belong, you will (consciously or subconsciously) exclude yourself. If, however, you see yourself as a valuable and accepted member of the community you find yourself in, others will pick up on that and go along with it.

keep in mind i've been drinking (WHY IS THAT ALWAYS THE EXCUSE?!)

[trinx.livejournal.com]

i was going to write a brilliant response (but it seems to already have been done)

and so i will say that you aren't alone

and that (i hope) you will never be unsurpised in the turning of events.

Re: the comparison trap

[samiamrex.livejournal.com]

ok, here's a question, prefaced by a snippet of (my) real life.

when i lived in southern california, it was an easy pitfall to compare myself to the myriads of blond robots who were my age and already working on their master's degrees, pursuing their hot jobs, and picking up a spouse along the way. since i was far from being on that path yet still lumped in with those folks due to my age, it was easy to fall into depression about it.

you've got to get over this feeling that you've missed out on stuff, or that you've done nothing with yourself by 40. really, get over it! i think you are just where you should be and can only move forward from this point onward. these constant comparisons are keeping you from being happy as you deserve to be.

question: what IF you lived in an environment where a single neat guy at 40 with a good paying job was nothing out of the ordinary? what IF you lived somewhere where you could make friends with other 40-50 year olds who didn't follow the normal path? musicians, poets, parents of some hip hip kids, really talented (some with degrees and cool jobs too), heartfelt folks? these are all gorgeous, successful people. some are single, some are not!

i'm only 27, but i've a bunch of friends who are my parents ages (give or take a decade), and ahem! they don't seem to be beating themselves up that they didn't follow these established paths. and they're certainly not remorseful about hanging out with 27 year olds.

in conclusion, getting outta SoCal might be magical.

complete stranger here, signing off. ;D