My summer is coming to a close, and though I've had plenty of time to think about and synthesize everything that's happened, I still like to put it into writing, and I've always been drawn to expression in the form of forum posting. My Friendships I just think it's funny. I definitely had an appreciation for how unique and good my high school experience has been, but I couldn't wait to move on. I was tired of my lack of confidence and social skills holding me back, and I thought college would help me break out of my shell. There's no doubt it has, but oddly enough it's been with all of my old high school classmates. I've been in my hometown since the middle of May, and since then, I've hung out with former classmates back in town for the summer on a very consistent and often basis. It happened over winter break while I was home as well. I'm ecstatic about this of course, but it just bothers me that I couldn't do this for the four years I was in high school. My quirky, diverse high school was full of awesome kids who actually cared, and it bothers me that it's only now, when it's so much harder to keep in touch since we're scattered around the country, that I've been able to have the kind of social life with them that I've always wanted. Don't get me wrong, I liked my time in high school, but I'm just wondering what things would be like if I had been like this for those impressionable years. It's also really bothering me that I'm noticing a reoccurrence of this pattern in college. I didn't make many friends my freshman year, and those I did make were only toward the end of the semesters, and we soon lost touch. Why is it that I'm only able to be friendly, open, and clever around people when I'm about to lose touch with them? My Brother And this situation with my brother...I'm not sure I like the turn it's taken, but I'm not sure what the alternative is. We've been good friends for the past couple years, but I'm afraid the friendship has run its course. You'd think that our starting college at the same time (We're five years apart if anyone has made it this far haha.) would make us relate to each other better, but I guess now that we're in the same phase of life, our polar opposite dispositions have only served to frustrate each other since we respond so differently to the same situations. I get that he's overcome some incredible obstacles to get where he's been, but he's become so cocky, and he's regained his adolescent invincibility complex. Yet he somehow feels the need to lecture me, trying to be the "big brother" despite his effective absence for the last decade and having no life experience that's relevant to me whatsoever. He has the gall to call me arrogant and selfish, trying to make me feel like the worst person ever because he didn't like the tone in my voice or whatever nuance he chooses to let knock the chip off his shoulder. He's been in a weird funk this whole summer, and I think he's having a relapse. It's not that he's addicted to one specific thing, but he's addicted to mind alteration in any form. And all of us in the family are suffering from it. I don't get it. Things are finally going his way, so he should no longer feel the need for escape, right? Yet he does the weirdest things to get any sort of high. He's mastered lucid dreaming to the point where he'll sleep 20 hours a day for a week straight. He'll stay up for 2 or 3 days straight until he's delusional. He's found out and tried every substance that he isn't tested for. And it's when he brought in one narcotic that I lost it. I went off on him, and it's there that he hit me in my most sensitive area: my orientation. When I told him I was gay last summer, the reception was shaky at best, but I thought everything was okay a year later. Well since he knows and has experienced everything from his party days, he decides to tell me that every guy has same sex curiosity, but that I just let that curiosity go too far. And since he has so graciously "accepted" my "lifestyle choice," I need to give him some credit and understanding for his. Really, dude? Go fuck yourself. His faulty logic on that and life in general becomes unbearable to me, and we get in almost daily fights. It's only after a heart-to-heart with my mom that everything clicks with me: why my parents are able to be so patient with him, why they hold him to such different standards than they do me. They won't directly say it, but they agree with me. My brother basically has a mental condition, either a handicap or an illness. He's had three major traumatic brain injuries in his life in addition to substance abuse, and though he has far above average mental capacity, he has no impulse control. Despite priding himself on his openmindedness, he has almost no ability to empathize, and scientific logic flies over his head. My whole life I've always taken these as negatives on his character that need to be corrected. I've taken his affronts and his selfishness way too personally. To most emotionally mature people that spend significant time with him, the situation is apparent. I've only now reached that point, and a paradigm shift like this takes a lot of getting used to. I've still gotten into heated arguments with him since, and for the past couple weeks up until just now, we hadn't seen each other much and I wondered if our friendship had run its course. However, we just went on a midnight walk together, and we're on good terms now. Now after years of failing to launch, he's finally moving out of my parents' house this next week, and if things go as planned, this is the last week we will live under one roof. This guy I met him almost a year ago (wow, time flies). I met him through friends when we visited his university. We immediately hit it off (which is very rare for me), and we kept in contact the whole semester. Over the months, we got to know each other, including that we shared the same orientation, and I soon started crushing. I visited him in December, and there we both felt the spark. We saw each other once more before the winter break, and there was definitely a mutual connection. To a certain extent, having the distinct possibility of a relationship helped give me the courage to come out to my parents. We kept in contact the whole break, and he was one of the first people I saw when I came back for the spring semester. I couldn't wait to see him, and I'm pretty sure the feeling was mutual. We hung out for 30 hours straight, and it was right after I got back from that that I came out to my first friend because I felt so happy. But something seemed to change after that. Maybe it was the start back of school, maybe I did something when we were hanging out, but he was much more distant. We saw each other a few times over the semester, but it was clear he was stretched thin by his responsibilities, so I understood. Still, it started becoming evident that even though he was choosing to not make the time for me, and I usually had to be the initiator of...well everything really. The last time we saw each other, I asked him what it was we had, and he said that we were basically just makeout buddies, that I should look elsewhere. He was going off to grad school in a year, and the 45 minutes between us made any sort of relationship impossible with him. It hurt, but it wasn't surprising. He still wanted to hang out and be friends, which I was happy to do because he meant that much to me. But our communication has become very sporadic, and it's almost exclusively dependent on my initiation of conversations. Still, I've been a sucker, and for every time he initiates a conversation, I'm satisfied enough to start ten. Well today he's said some things that for the first time have dampened my feelings toward him. Not because they were directed at me, but because they revealed certain things about his character that didn't set well with me. Even before this, though, I've known that nothing can ever work out, and it's better to just stop contacting him. I wish I could just get over him, but it's so hard. I mean, how can you let go of someone who helped give you the kind of courage I had, who was the first person to ever reciprocate your feelings (however little it might have been)? It's rare enough to find someone who is my type, much less someone that I'm emotionally attracted to. I'm having such a hard time letting go of what I have found, even if I know it's going nowhere. Man, this is probably the longest post I have ever made. If you made it this far, I highly commend you.
Thanks for sharing that! I remember reading something before about your relationship with your brother. My brother is 9 years older than me. He was a good older brother when I was young, but when I went away to umiversity, his attitude changed. It was as if he always felt in my shadow, that he was compared unfavourably to me, that he had to compete against me for attention, even though I didn't even live at home any more. We're great friends again now, but it mystifies me what has changed - he calls me and hugs me when I visit, he totally accepts my being gay and sends my partner birthday cards and asks after him, but why we spent 20 years with him leaving the room when I arrived, I still don't understand. Maybe your brother feels he has to live up to being your older brother, having taken so long to achieve "parity" with you in the education stakes. I understand completely about his lecturing you, though, given that he has drugs issues which he should concern himself with rather than telling you what you're doing wrong. Don't give up on him, though, he might be acting tough and like an asshole, but brothres should look out for each other - it's part of the deal. I'm not surprised by what you say of your friendships. You have the security of knowing that you're back in college in a few weeks, so it doesn't matter if you goof up with one or two of them. You're at ease because it doesn't matter and what you do today is not going to cause you shit for the next 4 years. Enjoy it - it's great you noticed it - I wish I'd been as self-aware as you are. Have a great time next semester - and keep us up to date with the lurve interest in your life :eusa_danc
Well okay...I talked on the phone with him today after confronting him about his communication problems, and I gained important insight. He basically won't let himself get close to people unless he knows they'll stay in his life a significant time. His two best friends in high school died in a car accident his senior year, and he's had other fairly close relatives pass away in recent years, and it's made him afraid of getting close to new people. Early on, while I was getting attached, he was thinking about how he was planning on moving out of state in the next year. He didn't know if our friendship would last until then, but he knew that he didn't want to leave me hanging should that time come. He never wanted to get involved with someone because he knew that he could drop a relationship (after all, he's had to do it several times in recent years), but he knew it wasn't fair to the other person. Even then, he didn't feel like our 45 minute separation made for a good relationship. Other than his opening up about the deaths in his life, this wasn't anything new. I don't know why I kept my hopes up for something more, but I appreciate his frankness. I basically told him that anytime he wanted to hang out, I'd be willing to set aside time for him. But I also told him that I'm tired of reaching out only to be ignored. It's completely up to him when/whether we hang out. He apologized and said he'd be better about it. We may not ever be in a relationship, but I think he's genuinely interested in keeping me in his life. I think I'm okay with that, and it's helped in my process of moving on.
