Published on 12, July, 2020
This is just an extension of things not making sense to us.
I've known of people telling me that as an adult, friendships are very different and hanging out together and having a fun time isn't something people have the time for. At the same time, I'd see photos of them on Instagram at a theme park or basking in the sunshine or whatever, and fairly regularly.
I get it, adult friendships ARE different to those you had as a child, but I don't get why people tended to discourage me, or made me feel bad for wanting those experiences.
Especially as I didn't get to have much of them as a child so there's a degree of "wanting to make up for it" now, as someone in my mid 20s.
I'm sure someone will tell me that I'm reading into it too much, or I've misinterpreted it.
I'm so used to being the odd one out that when I look at photo's of people I know hanging out with friends or telling stories about hanging out with friends, it feels like someone telling me about an episode in a soap opera. Luckily I don't want to do the things that they do or go to the places they hang out.
In my 20's and 30's I did feel the lack of friends very keenly and would wonder how people kept friendship groups, all my friends moved away over the course of about a year. I supose I'm just used to it now and no longer miss it all, its just one of those things other people do, that I don't.
A lot of the time I can convince myself that I don't care, because I don't have the desire to go to a festival (for example) or whatever people do.
Sometimes though, like today, I wake up and it all comes back. Like I'm completely missing out on life.
Sometimes on a sunny day I would actively go into town and walk about, hoping to bump into someone who recognises me. It's arguably less embarrassing than having to make the plan in the first place.
It's a delicate balance because I don't want to be entitled, and expect anything to be handed to me. But there are times where the opportunity has been there and I've completely messed it up because I tried to handle it on my own, and I didn't know what I was doing.
I tend to stay at home in the evenings and watch TV, generally preferring days out over nights out. The problem is I haven't been very good at articulating that.
When I used to make plans, I used to take it upon myself to invite random people. People who didn't actually know each other. It was a big mess and the worst part? It didn't even have to be. I put that pressure on myself.
I understand. In my younger days I felt it like a stab to the heart when I saw or heard about my “friends” going off and doing things without inviting me. Off having a life basically while I sat alone at home.
And today - a warm sunny day - if I were to go into town I’d see groups of friends sitting in beer gardens, sunbathing in green spaces together etc but I’d be by myself, separate from it all and unable to participate.
I've been to festivals and stuff like that and I can understand why you feel you've missed out, but I've found I much prefer watching it all on telly, you get a better view, you're not crushed and crowded by others, or overwhelmed with smells. Somewhere like Glastonbury was a pretty full on sensory experience when I went in my teens, it was tiny then compared to now.
I watch TV documentaries about places I'd like to visit, and then think, but I wouldn't get the access that I do on telly.
Living life through watching others may seem like missing out, but for all the good stuff, theres more bad stuff, airports, crowds, expense, ignorant people, hotels, restaurants with nothing you can eat.