08-28-05 @ 9:08 am EDT

I've settled down some since typing this up this morning. I don't feel like posting it now. I hate anyone reading this seeing how crappy I am, how bitchy and spiteful and awful. -_- But maybe it's better if I do, so people DO see how crappy I am. Which is the point of the entry after this one. I feel like anybody who approaches me deserves at least a warning, and perhaps this serves as one.

I really do NOT want replies to this entry.

I sent her an e-mail the same day I last posted. She replied.

I wish she hadn't. It took me all morning just to read her message. I wish I hadn't.

She had points, but I also feel she greatly misunderstood much of what I typed. But the tone she took with me was such that I don't give a f**k anymore and am not going to even bother clarifying. If she wants to believe the wrong thing about me then she can go right ahead.

This was what I had sent her. Mildly edited. If my tone was pissier than I had thought it was, I don't even give a shit by now.

I don't know if you even check your account much anymore but while I was logged in I wanted to try to explain what happened, if you will even read. If you don't then that's fine, nothing lost either way.

If you don't read much further then the main thing I wanted to say was that I'm sorry if I hurt you or made you feel bad. I have not read the last five e-mails you sent me after I sent my last mail. I saw the subjects of them though. The last one was entitled "Depressed" and that was what prompted me to write this, even with as bad an idea as this might be. I can only start from the beginning.

You see, I go through awful depressive phases myself, almost monthly, and I'm in the midst of one right now...the day before yesterday I cried so long and so hard that I've been showing the same symptoms of a cold, sore eyes, sneezing all day, etc. It must be hormonal but knowing that doesn't help, and it seems like every time it happens, events in real life help trigger it too. So when I saw the subject "Depressed," it made me cry, and in the small chance that I made you feel that way then I'm sorry because I didn't intend it, and really didn't think it would happen. If I in fact misunderstood the subject of the mail (like I said, I haven't read any of them), then you can just forget the rest of this. I realize I'm assuming a lot, and I feel like a psycho sending this e-mail to a near-total stranger, but it's not like we'll correspond now so...

I think the only thing I could have possibly done right out of this entire thing would have been if I'd simply never replied to your ad at all. This isn't anything personal. In fact I really HAD hoped we would be friends. But I think it was a huge mistake, and seeing how it turned out, I wish I'd never done it. You see, I think I went into this with a mistaken idea of how penpal sites work. I'll lay it on the line and totally humililate myself here. I have no real-life friends whatsoever, and what few people I write to online, I feel it's only a matter of time before they all end up losing interest in me too. I can't remember how much I told you about my luck with friends in my mails to you so I'll get it all out here. I just haven't been able to keep any friends, period. The one who lasted longest and supported me the most lasted about five years online. Last I knew he was still logging on frequently but he didn't have another word to say to me. His last two mails to me insisted everything was all right and he'd reply soon. He never did. I don't think I'll ever get over the pain of that, because it had TAKEN me those five years to finally trust him.

Another girl who I was so much like, I lost touch with out of my own fault; last summer I attempted to get back in touch. She was excited to hear from me. She asked me all sorts of questions and I wrote this stupid long e-mail that embarrassed me even then; I apologized for it. She insisted it was okay. A few short comments saying she'd reply when she could and then months passed in silence. A year later, still hurting (I don't forget things like this), I decided it would be best to just "burn the bridge" and wrote a journal entry about it. She wasn't reading anymore so I pointed it out to her. I wasn't RUDE in it but I was angry and never should have posted it, but I honestly thought it would set things right and give me closure, like the e-mail I sent you. Wrong. It just made it worse. -_- Her girlfriend appeared and called me stupid for sending such a long e-mail to a total stranger, and etc. etc. etc. We had not been total strangers, and she'd said the long mail was fine, so this was so hurtful. I asked that the first girl contact me directly and asked if there was any possibility that we might still be friends?

She said it was POSSIBLE, but she was so busy she had had to "cut" a lot of friends from her life, and she was more inclined to take her girlfriend's side over mine. (She didn't attempt to correct any of the mistaken assumptions her girlfriend had made about me.) I was badly hurt by this because not only had she decided she had to "cut" me, but she had apparently decided I was not important enough to TELL this. Needless to say, that was the end of that friendship.

And it's been thus with almost every other person I've tried to correspond with on the Web (and in real life, back when I HAD real-life friends). Down to all of my penpal attempts so far, about four or five now. I can't believe all the people on those sites who say they hate being left hanging but they so easily do it themselves.

Well, I did not want to be one of those people. No matter how lousily something might go, I vowed I would at least not do that thing and leave people hanging the way they kept leaving me. So I vowed that if a friendship looked like it wasn't going to work, I would at least SAY so, so the other party would not be left wondering since I hate that feeling and I hate inflicting it on anyone else. (I have left too many people hanging, myself. -_- )

I got hints from your first e-mails to me, and your photo albums. You are so popular and so busy! You have so much of a life. Even before I sent my last mail I was feeling so stupid for having written to you in the first place. Like I said, I had thought that people on penpal sites usually didn't HAVE many friends, and were basically lonely. I've since learned otherwise. If I had known that back then, I would not have bothered you. Not because I didn't want to know you or be your friend, but because I always fall through the cracks (see all the above), and I just didn't want to go through that again. But at least you had responded to my e-mail so I thought maybe there was hope.

I felt utterly foolish looking at you in your albums in the company of so many happy people, though. I really wondered why you were even on a penpals site? You look like you have so much to look forward to as it is. Yes, I'm envious of you.

And then you were too busy to reply because you were going to parties...I felt even stupider. -_- I greatly misunderstood your ad. Not your fault, just mine, for not knowing how such sites work. I know better now.

And then you did reply, and I opened it and read it and thought, this is okay; I kind of wanted to try snail mail anyway. I have not snail-mailed somebody in ages and I really wish for some real-world connection to somebody, even if it's just through a piece of paper. I haven't succeeded in finding that, though, either. But you were offering it so I was going to give it a shot.

I saw though that the e-mail wasn't to me but was to me and twelve other people...you were so busy with so many people, and work, and your life, that I could not believe you would be in the least bit interested in another bother like me. Maybe you had meant to remove your penpal ad or something? Or I just replied to it to late, or what...who knows. I just felt that if you were so busy with your life, and with so many other friends, then you would not even notice a nobody like me going missing. After all we had shared like two e-mails and that was it. I REALLY truly thought that I could simply never reply, and you wouldn't care in the least.

But I had promised NOT to do that to anyone, so I had to send something. So I typed up that letter. I was feeling very hurt and angry and upset and stupid and foolish...I may as well say this while I'm writing this here...but I tried to be as polite as I could. I really didn't want to insult or offend you. I just knew it wouldn't work. I'd already been through this before with so many people! In fact, when penpal sites didn't work, I even went around LiveJournal looking for people with my interests and ALL of them had well over fifty friends each! I always just...show up too late. And then fall through the cracks. I still remember in elementary school, all the people who, when they weren't all gathered together, were my friends; the time we were all gathered in the gym...and I faded into the background...and nobody even noticed when I turned and left. That, among people I already knew. This has happened so many times with people I DON'T know yet...I just couldn't stand the thought of dragging out the inevitable. I figured that if you couldn't send an individual mail then, then surely you would have even less time in the future. And I just cannot write to people when they're busy. I feel too guilty. I demand too much attention that others cannot give.

Another thing I should have known before visiting penpal sites. I may as well tell you now. I'm too selfish and clinging and needy for good friends and that's likely a main reason why nothing lasts. Yet I keep trying for some stupid reason.

I have not logged into this account since I wrote my last mail to you. I did not know you had replied at all. I avoided logging back in for so long for just this reason; I didn't want to see what you might have sent. I honestly thought your biggest response would be something along the lines of "Well why did you even waste my time!!" Because honestly, who gets to care about somebody else through two e-mails? Especially when they already have so many friends. I'm not saying this to insult you. It's just that I've never had so many friends, so I don't even know what it's like. I could never write to twelve people at once! Much less add another. I thought I was doing a huge favor by cutting it off. You were so busy, and I am so clingy, that I could only be doing the right thing by cutting it off rather than trying to drag it out when I was sure that it wouldn't work. (Your photos of you at your gatherings, your Harry Potter parties...you have so much to do. All I do is sit at a computer and type.) I could only be a hassle and an unwanted burden. Even if you said I wasn't, you would just be being nice because all the other people I tried writing to said the same thing, and all ended up leaving me hanging. I didn't want to go through with that so it was just easier to send that e-mail and cut it off for you, save you the trouble of writing to somebody like me.

It looks like maybe I messed up though, if I'm assuming the right thing about the subject of your "Depressed" mail. I honestly did not believe you would care much beyond feeling a bit irritated that I had wasted your time. I didn't think you'd write a 39kb e-mail... -_- And now it's too late and I'm far too humiliated to read any of them. I wouldn't have even bothered with THIS mail if not for that subject, "Depressed," and if not for that being the exact way I'm feeling right now. I hate this feeling, and I hate the slightest chance I made anybody else feel the same way. So if I made you feel depressed, then I'm sorry. I really didn't think it could happen, because I've just always been the person who fades into the background, and nobody ever gets depressed over that.

Of course, I could be totally wrong and there was another reason behind the subject, but I'm too ashamed to read any of it now, so I'm sorry also that I made you take so much time to type those mails. I realize that was a lot of time you could hardly afford since you're not online much.

I'm trying to think of what else I had to say while I'm here and have the few guts left to actually send this. Coming up blank. I just can't stress enough that I honestly thought you would not care or notice much once I bowed out. Nobody else ever did. I still do feel strongly that there likely not enough similarities between us to ever be friends, and/or that you just have too much of a real life whereas I am too clingy and needy, for it to ever work out; I'm almost completely sure that if I hadn't sent that e-mail, then one of us would have left the other hanging, SOMEWHERE down the line; I just thought it would be easier and less painful for me, and less annoying for you, if I did it first.

I didn't think anything in it might end up hurting you at all. If anything, *I've* always been the person e-mailing the other party several more times to ask what I did wrong, and never hearing back...I really did not think I would end up doing that to someone else. I'm sorry.

You likely forgot about me and moved on by now since it's three weeks since your last mail...but I felt such that I felt I had to try to make it right in some stupid pathetic way, since my last attempt failed so miserably. I really feel that this attempt won't do much better, especially if it just drags up bad feelings again. I still can't assign myself such importance as to think you would care that much about me, but in the slight chance I'm wrong, then I'm sorry also if this just makes it worse. I just didn't know what else to do.

While I hate the thought of not being sure if you even get this, I ask you to please not reply since I feel so ashamed and humiliated and stupid now that I would not be able to read it, just like the others. I already wasted so much of your time, which never would have happened if I had listened to the voice in my head calling me STUPID when I first replied to your ad. That voice has never been wrong yet--it's yelling at me right now--but I don't know what other thing I can do to let you know, I am not worth you feeling depressed over.

I guess my greatest hope is that you read this, think, "Bitch," then delete it and forget about the whole thing. I did mean it when I told you you are lucky and I hope you realize that, and that some of us can only wish for a taste of that feeling. This e-mail just proves it. I really do think that, no matter how you may have ended up feeling, I saved you a LOT of trouble by cutting it off early. I just wish I had not bothered you in the first place. Sorry that I cannot take that back.

It took me all morning to write this and I send it now without looking it over, before I can chicken out yet again. I'm sorry if it just makes it worse. At least I will not bother you further, I promise.

--T.

My summary of her response will yes be onesided. She said I had REJECTED her because I apparently can't make friends with people unless they have NO other friends whatsoever. She said something like, "Friendships take time. You can't immediately become the sun in someone else's sky. You can't expect everybody to have NO other friends whatsoever before they can be friends with you. If this is how you feel then I think that's the reason why you have no friends." From my e-mail she picked up that I reject EVERYBODY who has even ONE other friend to rely on, that I believe I have to become the most important thing in everyone else's life, and that I made her feel like she should apologize to ME. All throughout the mail, tossing hints that she believed I was mentally unbalanced and my lack of friends was entirely my fault for being such a bitch to people. This is what I get for bothering to tell the truth. F**k it. If this is what it gets me. I'm glad I never wrote her back in the first place, I wish I hadn't BOTHERED with this one, and I'm not going to bother reading her other f**king e-mails if this is what she got out of my message.

Yes, she had some points. I even admitted in here that I rejected her too fast. That I am threatened when people have other friends to rely on. That I expect too much. (Nice of her to tell me all this, like I wasn't aware, when I even SAID it in my mail to her.) But I never once said I couldn't be her friend BECAUSE SHE HAD OTHER FRIENDS. Hello! She first told me SHE WAS TOO BUSY GOING TO PARTIES TO REPLY, and then when she DID reply, she SENT ME A FORM REPLY. THAT was why I felt it wouldn't work. Why the hell would she have time for snail mail when she couldn't even find the time to send an individual reply? I am to believe it would be less time consuming and easier to write on some paper, pull out an envelope, fold the letter, stick it in, lick the envelope, seal it, address it, stamp it, and drop it in the mail (for TWELVE PEOPLE)--rather than to SEND A SHORT E-MAIL saying, "I'm sorry Tehuti, I don't have much time online anymore; would you like to snail mail instead?"? None of this would have happened in the first place--not one bit of it--if she had done that one small thing. Even if she had sent the same damn words to everybody in her address book, if she had taken the tiny extra step of just sending it to everyone INDIVIDUALLY, I never would have even known. I didn't demand to be the "sun in her sky." The only thing I wanted, and that I assumed came with the territory (stupid of me!), was to be considered at least important enough that I warranted a bit of individual attention. That when I wrote to her, she would write to ME, and her letter to me would be to ME only. After all--I THOUGHT that was what FRIENDSHIP was about. Not stupid-ass CARBON-COPY REPLIES. I'm learning this the hard way. I admit I was an idiot. (I guess all those other people on penpal sites DEMANDING NOT TO BE SENT CARBON COPIES are idiots, too. I am not the only one.)

I even said in my e-mail that her abundance of friends discouraged me, but it did NOT stop me from trying. It was the fact that she didn't have the time to send an individual mail (oh, at least until I COMPLAINED about it!) that stopped me.

In her reply she said she often feels SO alone and SO out of place and like SO much of an alien in this world...BULLSHIT! I am sick and tired of people who so plainly have DOZENS of friends whining about how ALONE they feel and how SAD they are. I am pissed off with her because here she is bitching at me about me wallowing in my own misery, but look at her. She doesn't even realize how lucky she is. She got awfully defensive about my comments about her photos and her friends. "I have a boyfriend but that's about all bla bla bla." Well guess what? I don't even have THAT. I don't have a JOB, don't have real-life FRIENDS, don't go to PARTIES like YOU do. I know that people who seem to have lots of friends and who do lots of things can be shy and unfulfilled. And at the moment (at least, before I made the mistake of reading her mail), I feel a bit lucky that I at least have a FEW people communicating with me, at the moment. But for cripes' sake, what the hell are people like her doing on PENPAL sites when they don't have the f**king time to reply to the people they're ALREADY in touch with? I am a shitty attempt at a friend but at least I don't CARBON-COPY my e-mails to people, and I never will. According to her you would think this is such a huge insult to her that this hurt me. Well, if you can't send individual mails then maybe you shouldn't be asking for MORE friends on penpal sites. People tend to get pissed off when all they get is copies of mail that everybody else got, too. Especially when that mail tells them the person sending it DOESN'T HAVE TIME to mail them.

Do you know what I never told her? I often typed in search terms to go finding info about the people I tried to penpal with to see if I could find more about them on the Web, and she brought up some hits. She had posted an ad on a site for EXTREMELY ANXIOUS people, looking for friends. Now isn't that strange? The webmaster on the site had his own page set up talking about other sites for shy people and how often he would come across people who were supposedly SO shy, yet they had jobs and friends and relationships and were incredibly popular, and to him, he just couldn't understand their concept of "shy." Well, take a look at how it comes around. When I first e-mailed her she talked a lot about an ex-boyfriend of hers being so painfully shy, but she had not a word to say about HERSELF feeling that way. She had no problem being seen as outgoing THEN. And say whatever you want--but if you're writing to over a dozen people, and attending PARTIES, and public meetings and Renaissance Faire things, and have a job and a boyfriend, and likely other REAL-LIFE FRIENDS you rely on, you are NOT f**king abnormally SHY. You may be a little shy, a little anxious, but don't even DARE try to compare yourself to me. And don't even dare say you are SO anxious and lonely and messed up when you have so many people you trust and rely on and so much of a life. "Feeling like an alien in this world"...whatever. I'm glad we never got to know each other if THAT'S her idea of "feeling lonely." I bet she is one of those f**king "tough-love" people who think that telling somebody what a LOSER they are when they already know it is the way to cheer them up. She even had the gall to say that "I hope this e-mail helps you in a way, though I doubt it'll change anything because it's been my experience that negative people rarely change themselves." Yeah? Well. Nice to never know you, too.

(Something I just thought of, too. Since it's MY fault that I never keep friends, then, if she's feeling SO lonely and alien in the world, maybe she should look to see what's wrong with HERSELF before hanging out on penpal sites...? My lack of friends is MY fault, and her "lack" of friends is NOT HER fault...? Interesting. Not surprising, though.)

God, did I read her ad wrong. I do not even know why she posted it in the first place. Isn't it interesting that she hadn't a word to say about being too busy to reply because she was GOING TO PARTIES? NONE of these people who post these ads are really looking for friends! They already HAVE so many that they can't find time to write to more! So why do they post them? Do they REALLY think they are that poorly off?? I wish they could set foot in my shoes. Know how it feels to be so terrified that you spend a half hour just working up the courage to read a reply e-mail, only to find it's exactly what you thought it would be, another person telling you what a loser you are because you bothered trying to be truthful. At least we agree that it was a stupid mistake of me to have contacted her in the first place. Why did she write those other five mails? I didn't say much more in the above mail than I had already said in my last one to her. It was just longer and more detailed. NOW she sees fit to tell me what a bitch and a loser I am? Well gee, she could've saved me the damn trouble and said that BEFORE she sent those five e-mails, including the one entitled "Depressed." Yeah, "Depressed." Based on how she defines "shy" I doubt she knows what "depressed" feels like, either. I'm sick of people who feel a little bit blue saying they are SO depressed, and people who might blush a little and stammer a bit getting to know somebody, posting penpal ads on sites for ABNORMALLY SHY PEOPLE!

And isn't it nice that she blames all of these failures squarely on me. She said this repeatedly. "I think this failure to maintain friendships is your fault." How thoughtful of you. Never mind that ALL of the penpals I tried, like six or seven of them, I didn't even have the F**KING CHANCE to spew out all this negative crap BEFORE THEY DUMPED ME FIRST. You hear that? How the HELL did MY negativity drive them all off...when we didn't even exchange enough info for them to tell HOW NEGATIVE I AM? (The most negative I EVER got in any of my responses to people was "I've been left hanging plenty of times, so I ask that you please let me know if this isn't working, and I'll do the same." Common courtesy! Lot of good it did. They all left me hanging. That was nothing more negative than what anybody ELSE posts in their damn ads. I bet it is their fault too when they send cheery responses like the ones I sent and still get left hanging? Oh, is it just my fault then? How odd.)

And does my negativity in ANY way EXCUSE the people who insisted REPEATEDLY that "Oh don't worry, I PROMISE I'll get back to you!" and then didn't? I give people plenty of damn chances to just SAY they don't want to write anymore. According to her I guess it's just too much to expect the truth, huh?

And how is it that ALL of those people who did get to know me, then ended up leaving me hanging, didn't have a problem with my negativity in the FIRST place? I'm not hiding it! Here it is, in its full glory! See what I am? See how bitchy and spiteful and pissy I am? I never denied it! Those people who DID get to know me knew all along how I was. They claimed it didn't bother them. Then left anyway. Well gee, whose fault do you think THAT was? Who's rejecting whom?

Based on her tone I just KNOW she would have been the one to end up rejecting me first. I DID save her the trouble. I just made the mistake of bothering in the first place, and of trying to clarify what had happened in the hopes she wouldn't feel depressed anymore (yeah, like she ever did), when it turns out she thinks I was a bitch all along. Well, ditto right back at her. I don't have a thing against popular people. I can try to be friends with popular people. That was never the F**KING issue that she made it out to be. The issue was that she didn't have TIME for everything and she couldn't even admit it. It is MY fault and *I* am the bad person for getting upset when she posts an ad looking for MORE friends and then can't even bother to send them a decent reply? I'm a bad person for assuming that FRIENDSHIP means I warrant a LITTLE individual attention? Well gee, it's nice how everything is always MY fault.

I even told her I didn't wish her to reply. How she thinks that reply would help "boost my confidence, since you need it" (how observant and thoughtful of you to remind me!), is beyond me.

This is always what I get for trying to clarify where I'm coming from. "It's YOUR fault, YOUR fault, YOUR fault." I understand some things are my fault, probably even most things, but at least I can say it. I even said it in this stupid letter. Interesting that she completely missed what it was that really went wrong, and managed to make me feel like SHIT all over again in the process.

If you don't want any LONELY LOSERS to contact you, then why post your f**king ad in the first place? I had thought that was what penpal sites were for, lonely people, but was I ever wrong. It seems the only people that hang out on them HAVE tons of friends already. Nice how things work. The POPULAR people hang out together while the LOSERS always hang alone. Yes, she was QUITE sore that I saw her as popular, as if I were insulting her by saying it when that wasn't my intent. I think I touched a nerve for a reason.

I think I really SHOULD become like other people. Leave them hanging, and not care how I make them feel. See an e-mail entitled "Depressed," and just delete it. It's only what society expects from people nowadays, and all the popular people seem to be doing it. She and all these other people, and probably anybody who reads this, already think I'm a bitch and a loser and I bring this all on myself. Why not prove them right? Trying to break out of this shell and be something at least a little bit better hasn't done me much good so far. And she already said I am unlikely to change. Seeing as she made that assumption about me, why not prove her right?