152. More than a girlfriend

So, it's late, and I'm breaking my long LONG blog silence to post this thing I just wrote out.  I'm not sure if it's appropriate for this blog or not, but... I wrote it and I have nowhere else to put it, so it is going here... It's kind of raw and definitely unedited...I apologize in advance...

I've said it before… or blogged it before,  I guess… but you know what I want?  I want someone to care…to really want to know about me.  To be curious about my life, for me to be a priority in their minds. 

I’m not entirely sure what it would feel like, honestly, but I imagine it would be awesome.  It would be amazing to have a conversation with someone where I wasn't the only one asking questions… where I would say something and there would be follow up questions because the person I am talking to actually wants to know more about me.  I seriously feel desperate for it.  I find myself saying things in conversations on purpose to invite questions (which I know is passive aggressive, so I try not to do it, but sometimes I can’t help it. I just really want to feel someone’s interest), and no one asks,.  Or they ask, and I get one or two sentences in describing whatever it is I want to talk about and then they start talking about themselves.  And I revert to my usual status of listening, and asking questions and follow up questions and giving my opinion on their lives. 

It’s been a lifelong thing, really… my mother doesn't know me.  Not really.  It’s evident in her gifts to me which in no way reflect any knowledge of who I am.  Seriously, she buys herself something and then just buys another one and gives the second one to me.  So I have hats and pots and books that are just doubles of what are in her house.  And I have so many memories of trying to actually tell her about something in my life, a story from work or something, and I will be saying something and all of a sudden she will say “Sorry, I wasn't listening… what were you saying?”… which will deflate me, and now I don’t want to tell her, but I will… and I can see her using all of her energy to try and pay attention to something she clearly doesn't care about.  It hurts.  Oh, and then there’s the times I've actually argued with her about who I was.  I remember when I was in middle school and the whole introvert/extrovert, Myers-Briggs test was sort of becoming popular.  I remember asking her and her friends who were talking about it one night what it all meant, and I listened to their descriptions and said “oh, okay… I think I’m an introvert…” and having all of these people, including my mother argue with me and insist that I was an extrovert.  None of them would take my word for it, it drove me crazy.  My mother to this day doesn't think I’m an introvert, but that’s partially because she thinks there’s something wrong with introverts.  She would never say that specifically, but she has said stuff like “wanting to be alone, there’s something wrong with that…” so you know, that’s exactly what she’s saying, she just doesn't know she’s saying it. 

I’ve been kind of exploding with this recently.  Stupid things like… I've been reading a lot of books about history lately, and the other day I went out for dinner with a friend of mine and wanted to talk about this book I read with her.  So I did.  And the next week we were making plans again to hang out, and she actually said to me “I want to go for dinner, but not if you’re going to talk about that history stuff again…” and I was… hurt.  Of course.  I mean, I get that not everything that’s interesting to me is going to be interesting to everyone around me, but well…a)that was rude, and b)I can’t tell you how many conversations I've had with friends talking about things that are not interesting to me, but are important to them, and because my friends are important to me I listen and care about it.    Case in point, I went for dinner with this friend again, and we spent the entire meal talking about her work.  Not exactly something that would be of interest to me,  but I listened and engaged because she is my friend.  I've listened to my friends talk about their boyfriend/girlfriend issues till I was blue in the face.   When one of my best friends had her kids, I listened to and engaged in endless conversations about sleep training and potty training… not exactly riveting stuff, but stuff that was obviously important to her, and consuming her thoughts at the time.  I try to have one conversation about history and apparently I've crossed a line? 

Okay, so that was extreme, I know… most of my friends aren't that rude.  They just… are obviously not interested.  I say something and they don’t engage and I either continue and feel really awkward or I  eventually just fade out and start asking them questions about their life that they want to talk about.  Am I just so fucking boring? Or is it just a lack of confidence on my part?  I remember once asking someone how they talked in group settings.  Cause I find it really hard.  I start to talk and people just talk over me.  I've been told by people the trick is to just keep talking, but when I do that a)I feel horrible and b)it doesn't work.  People just keep talking over me and no one pays attention. 

I can’t change who I am entirely, I’m not going to figure out the answer and become a master of self confidence, and learn how to command attention.  I don’t really want that anyway… I don’t really like being the center of attention.  But I would just like to feel that there is one person who cares about what is going on in my head.  Who I could sit there and talk about sleep training or potty training, or what would be the equivalent in my life – a curriculum change at my school, the latest book I've read on the Taiping Revolution,  my thoughts about my coworkers… and this person would care enough about me to actually engage in a conversation (a two way conversation…not one where I just talk and they don’t participate…) with me about it. 

So… I would love to have a girlfriend… I would… but more than that, I just want someone… someone who wants to know me.  Is this selfish? Probably… maybe… And it’s definitely late at night, and I’m definitely feeling super emotional.  And I know that writing this post is prompted by the fact that I have tried to have a conversation today with three different friends about something weird that happened to me yesterday and I just can find anyone who has the time to listen.  And maybe they are legitimately busy or whatever… but still… it shouldn't be impossible for me to have this one bloody conversation… I should be able to find someone to talk to.  It’s not a desperate situation, I’m not needing to talk about something life or death, I just want to talk about this weird thing that happened… and there is no one… I have no one that I can turn to who I feel I can trust will reliably be there to listen to me, and to actually care to hear what I have to say.  That’s what I want.  More than a girlfriend right now, that’s what I want…