Wallflower

December is coming and I want to be able to take my boys on a vacation and yet the thought of doing that on my own is thoroughly depressing. I wish I had another family that I always went and had adventures with that I could do this with. It's not that I can't pack up the car and rent a house and do these things, it's just that I feel so alone. And yet I don't want to just hang out at our house the whole time either. What do I do? Do I post in Facebook that I want to go in a vacation with someone? No. That didn't work with camping this summer. That's not how things work. People are already buddied up. How do I do this? Who do I reach out to? I hate feeling so alone. Makes me feel like the awkward teenager at the dance all over again. And not just because of boys, but friends in general. Why is this? Does everyone feel this way? Is this just a personal struggle, as in everyone struggles with different things? There's irony in the fact that the two of us always did everything together. We weren't one of those couples that took a lot of time to do things separately. So much for that as a theory about what makes relationships work or not work. So, I'm unaccustomed to doing things with other people like some friends are.

The feelings of rejection just spiral and swirl. This rejection is connected to other experiences of rejection. I've been reading Wild by Cheryl Strayed. In the section I read last night she talked about getting laid after being on the trail for two months and going into a bar in Ashland. Why are some people like that? Guy magnets. And then others of us, not so much? And it seems to have little to nothing to do with appearance. And seemingly I can't figure out what personality trait holds the key to it either. (Except that sometimes I think the more broken the girl or woman the more attractive she is, but that's definitely not always the case at all.) So what gives? I'm forty years old, and I'm back wondering what is it I don't have? Shit. I don't want to be in this place emotionally. I was there for a long time. While still being happy and whole and confident and engaged with life around me. The question haunted me nonetheless. I don't want to be back in that spot. And yet I already find myself comparing. How easily that author got hooked up with someone. How another acquaintance who is going through the same thing, but nine months behind me, had come-on offers within weeks of her husband's announcement. How some women respond to this by going out and having lots of causal sex, yet I know that wouldn't even be possible if I tried. I'm getting defensive just thinking about what I know others would say about this, that I don't put myself in those scenarios. But I KNOW. I've been at this game long enough to know what is the reality in my own life better than anyone else. I know that my sister can go running up a mountain and on any given day she could have sex with a man she meets if she wanted too, without even coming on to him. I could go running up the same mountain and pass the same men and at most exchange friendly smiles. THIS IS NOT IN MY HEAD.
It's not even that I want to have sex with just some man (or even a significant man quite yet), but I'd damn well like to believe that the opportunity is knocking on my door.