End of An Era

As readers will know, he who I call my best friend and my business partner, he who once said that I was like a brother; a member of the family, has found himself a boyfriend and is busy playing house. While it seems normal that his attention should be focused on this new development in his life , I find myself feeling the cold. This is not the first time that this happens; I am pretty sure I blogged about this at the time but I can locate the post for some reason.

I visited the happy couple's new place last week. I felt so out of place. Not because I felt unwelcome but because I was struck by the sudden difference between our two lives.

For the time we have known each other (almost 4 years now I think), we seemed to be more or less on a par: both more or less loners living in a room without much focus on where we were headed. The difference being that I was being my usual self while he was recovering from some rather disturbing and unsettling events in his life. Being there, in that rather nice flat, looking at the space and being told about the details of the furniture and their plans to arrange the place, it felt like he had moved into adulthood and I was stuck in a different world of outdated adolescence.

Where we used to be constantly in contact either by phone or the internet and met several times a week, we are now barely in contact once a week and meet about every two weeks. When we meet now we don't seem to have much to say to each other and usually stick strictly to "business" matters. He tells about people coming to visit the new flat, and has house parties and barbecues and I can't help (probably irrationally) that I am being kept away from this. Not of course that I am owed everything. Perhaps, for some reason, the boyfriend has put an embargo on me, I don't know. In any case, it seems that something has been broken but I am not even sure that he realises that.

This is clearly the end of an era but unfortunately this doesn't seem to be marking a new beginning for every one involved and I am find it heard to adjust to the new situation.

In the past few months, I have met several (3/4) guys on the Internet with whom I thought I could become friends. We got along nicely online and when we met in the "real world", things were fine too. This would have (and has, to a very limited extent,) provided some affective balance. These connections however didn't go further than that first meeting (there was possibly a second one in some cases) and this is the part I don't quite understand.

I would not really be bothered by this if I was not aware that this has been a recurring pattern throughout my life. Sooner or later (and it is usually sooner rather than later), people seem to loose interest in me, whether on the net or in real life. Even people who initiate contacts (and this is mostly the case) don't seem to be willing to pursue things very far.

I have a long and almost continuous history of exclusive friendships, both with boys and girls, and this has provided me with an affective balance that made things bearable or hid the obvious disfunction. All have waned after a few years however.

With the people mentioned above, I had made it clear in advance that I was not interested in anything sexual with them (this was not always done in so many words but I think the message as always been clear). There can therefore not be any disappointment of expectations in this area.

Random people regularly tell me that I look sad or miserable but that is probably because they rarely get a chance to see me interacting with other people and I don't see how one can be lively and smiling when not doing that.

To compound the above my not having worked for the past year means that I spend all my time at home in a tiny room. I probably go out on average 3 times a week (once for food shopping, once for rehearsal with the Chorus, some weeks, there is not third times). My contacts with the external world are limited to this and a few barren words exchanged with strangers online.

I usually warn people when I first meet them that they will soon loose interest. They protest that it is not likely but (and it may be a self-fulfilling prophecy) they always end up taking their distances. I would very much like to understand what I am doing wrong here to then try and correct the situation. I have thought on the problem for years now, included other people in my musings but to no avail.

I am so used to the situation that am not even really depressed or even sad about all of the above, simply frustrated at not being able to understand what is going on or able to do something about it.