Re: Confessions and Lamentations

I'm sorry you feel this way.

I won't deny that its tough. While I'm not exactly a self-imposed exile; the fact that there are no girls currently in my private life makes life a little more lonely but also makes my emotional life less mood-swingy.

But even though I'm a GLer who must hide my GL from my peers, I know that I'm more than just that. I identify more as a foreign film buff or comix geek than as a GLer. And I feel I have more in common with my RL friends with whom I can discuss Robert Bresson or Alan Moore than I do with my peeps here. ( I value GC, but we are a pretty random assortment.)

You can and should connect to friends on so many other levels. Surely you haven't reduced all your interests solely to those connected to GL.
There's a big difference between selective disclosure and living a lie. I don't shove my Atheism down the throats of my comix friends or raise the topic artificially. It just doesn't come up. Nor do I agonize over this non-disclosure.
There are so many facets of myself. But I don't confuse truth-telling with full-disclosure. I would sound like a head-case if I unburdened myself of everything important to everyone regardless of context.

Your daughter is trying not to shut you out of her personal life and that of her friends. But she needs friends who are her girl-friends and not your LGF. She's sent a clear message that if you try to claim her friends she won't bring them around. And at her age, peer-group friendships form a large part of one's identity.

Your projection of motives onto Penelope doesn't do much good. One should remain wary of reading confirmations of your internal desires into an external situation. I'm not saying it can't happen; its just probably not happening as often as it seems. And a neutral/skeptical attitude allows a clearer view of the world outside of your skull.

You know what you need to do. You need to stop drinking, stop torturing yourself over whether your feelings are reciprocated, stop thinking so much about yourself and start being genuinely and selflessly involved in things outside of yourself.

Dante