I don’t have many friends. I never have, really. Most of my friendships are born online, for a variety of reasons; mostly, it’s easier for me to feel at ease without the added fear, or anxiety if you will, of being judged for how I look, or how I dress, or how I move, or how I speak. Moreover, I’m an introvert and I just don’t do well in social situations, so I simply have few opportunities of meeting new people, especially since I finished my school cycle. Working from home is cherry on top, but that’s something I actually welcome. The thing is that is even when I have the chance to be social, I am not the kind of person who will strike up a conversation with strangers. Being an introvert nerd, my interests lie with the deep, and I’m given to understand that it’s inappropriate to discuss the question of life, the universe and everything with strangers.
So most of my friendships start online, and sometimes, if distance allows, they become physical; they don’t have to in order to be real, mind, indeed I have had far more honest friendships with people I never had the chance to meet than with people I had spent years going to school with.
And yet, the allegedly “more real” part of friendship, that is the meeting up and doing things together, often leaves me sorely disappointed. I am very easily forgotten. Oftentimes attempts to meet up, with all the best intentions, wind up into nothing. Not once, not twice, but repeatedly. There are people who claimed to care about me and wanting to meet me who never found a few spare hours in over a year, despite us living a couple dozen kilometers away; on my end, my only request was to be told at least one or two days before as I have work arrangements to deal with, but other than that , I’m generally easily available. In all fairness, however, I have had appointments I took a raincheck on due to sudden anxiety, though I’m working on that because sometimes forcing myself is all I need to have a very good time. I’m thinking about one person in particular here, who is actually currently going through some problems, and whom I would love to help out if only I could. That also makes me feel even more useless: I rationally know it’s just how it is, from my own experience, but my subconscious disagrees.
The worst part is when such things happen even online. With a few notable exceptions, I’m the one who always initiates a conversation with others. Perhaps it’s laziness on their part, knowing I will look for them. But it’s hard not to think that if I didn’t look for them, they would not look for me either. And sometimes, in a bout of psychological self-harm, I do just that: I stop looking for them and see how long it takes until anyone looks for me first. It is true that some don’t out of respect, because they know that my response to being overwhelmed is to withdraw, and I appreciate it. But at the same time, after a while, it simply becomes evident that I’m easily disposable.
If I’m around, good; if I’m not, who cares? But is it even good at all if I am around? It makes me wonder. It certainly doesn’t help my self-esteem to be made painfully aware that I may disappear, and few would even notice until much later.