Let's Talk about Us

I've joined a spiritual group that meets on Wednesdays. A thousand repetitive instincts are currently working to make sure I never return, but I've set my intention to keep up with it, because it is casual, moderate, and interfaith. At my first meeting last Wednesday, I think I realized why these instincts are so impossibly flighty. I have no concept of connection.

One of the main tenants of this group is the connectedness of all things. I've looked into it. It's the food chain, the circle of life, the works. In that way, it makes sense, but trying to apply it to my personal life is like dividing by zero. It just doesn't compute.

Growing up in Utah, sometimes dubbed "Mormonia," when you're not a member of the fold and are raised to embrace that fact, you belong to "US," and the Mormons belong to "THEM." It's the same when you go to a Catholic high school. If you cross yourself with a smiley face, it's because you're part of a smaller "US" compared to a greater "THEM." If you're not Catholic, Mormon, Evangelical, Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Zoroastrian, or even Atheist, suddenly, tiny you, of "US," are separate from a titanic "THEM." So long as you embrace that separateness, you will never belong to any one of those groups. That's tricky when looking for a place in the world.

That doesn't just apply to religion, mind you. When developing a personality and a relationship with people at large, if you don't want to be too mean, too nice, too smart, too stupid, too funny, too melancholy, too analytical, too spontaneous, too dramatic, too down-to-earth, too admiring, too condescending, too passionate, too apathetic, too macho, too effeminate, et cetera, but you look around and see hundreds of people who are too much of something, suddenly, "US" shrinks to 12-point, Helvetica "ME," and "THEM" becomes the remainder of this blog post.

Twenty-four years down the line, the insanity of this mentality has suddenly become clear. I am actively resisting belonging to any particular group out of fear that belonging to that group would alienate others in other groups. In so doing, I have distancing myself from every group and wondering why no one has decided to join me. Maybe it's just the word "alienation" that's taken me to this extreme. I've been friends with people from all sorts of different backgrounds, so why is it so hard for me to accept that they could be friends with me if I belonged to something that they did not?

I'm going to stick with this group. If I'm going to learn how to progress in life, it will not be alone. Maybe that's the secret to overcoming Asperger's. The more time I spend around people, the less trouble I will have with seeing the truth that there really is no "THEM." It's all "US."

Familiar

There is a familiar deer in a familiar forest eating familiar grass under a familiar blue sky. It dines with familiar squirrels and listens to familiar birds. It hears a familiar twig snap and recognizes the familiar smell of danger. And so it bolts, in a way familiar to us.

In the past few years, dating has become a cervine lifestyle: The moment I hear that familiar twig snap, I don't care if it's a mountain lion or a careless rabbit, I'm ready to get the hell out of there. It wasn't always this way. In fact, there was a time when I used to lie down and present my vulnerable underbelly to the mountain lions and say, "Here, this portion would be rather tasty, don't you think?" Unfortunately, when the mountain lions decided I didn't taste very good after all, I learned that self subjugation hurts worse than being disemboweled. Now, I'm not so much fleeing for fear of pain as for fear of shame.

I've broken things off with the Gentleman about five times now, but we're still dating. I attribute this to the fact that I haven't actually mentioned it to him. The past two weeks, the twigs have been snapping left and right, but I just can't tell if it's a mountain lion or a rabbit trying to mess with me. I madly want to know: Is he watching me? Is he interested? Why isn't he responding to me? Why doesn't he ask me about such and such? What is he doing messing around online at four in the morning when I sent him a text message question at two this afternoon? Shit, I'm out of here. Oh... There was a family feud... and he figured I was asleep by the time it was done... and he didn't get up until late. Okay, that's kind of considerate. Rabbit in lion's clothing.

Next time: Waiting late for a call to hang out. No call. Send passive-aggressive text about call. No answer. Find answer next morning: babysitting nephews. Respond. Nothing until later.

It's this crazy pinball track from fight to flight to collapse, and it's reawakening a side of me that I really hoped had been dragged away by the mountain lions. Now, every time there is no immediate response, I instantly develop a new scenario in which he is a combination of all of my exes: their journeys that I hinder, their secrets, their affairs, their lies, their patronizations. The psychosis takes less than five minutes to start and an hour to explode into this absurd, self-loathing, woe-is-me, screw-dating mentality, which, once the rabbit pulls off the lion's mask, leaves me ashamed again, yet insufficiently so to prevent another lapse the next time.

So basically, I am a familiar deer in a familiar meadow, waiting for the familiar snap of a familiar twig, but where it is snapping and where to run, remain unfamiliar. The more I run, the more exhausted I become. But what is the alternative? How does one face the lion's mask and still be happy after it's revealed to be a rabbit? Furthermore, how does one enjoy the meadow when there may be a lion nearby? This isn't one of nature's unavoidables; there are methods of defense, but what are they... in the world outside of simile?

Update
Now that he got back to me and very casually brushed me off on our evening plans without a "Sorry" or a "Wish you could be here," but a promise that he would send pictures from his imminent week-long trip, the decision is made. I'm not running; I'm kicking his ass out of the meadow. Positive attitudes aside, I think I have a right to be angry, and in response to the stereotype that people with Asperger's can't take social cues, I'm a hell of a lot more observant than he is. And here I am shaming myself for being pessimistic. You know what? It's better to be single and alone than involved and alone on a Saturday night. Central finger... salute!