The party I went to Friday was a catastrophe. I went, and nobody was there. I was very uncomfortable. I only had three contacts and the only response to my messages before or during the event were from the one not going
I messaged, “What time will you be there?” “I’m here” , “I don’t see anyone” “are you here?” “I’m leaving” all without a response. Not receiving a reply beforehand, I was stressed going In.
The place had multilevel wood deck floors, all outside. There were stairs and ramps leading from level to level. Everything was wet from rain. Some of the ramps or stairs had no hand railings, and there was a dropoff to the level below. As soon as I walked in, this little kid violently crashed a two wheel scooter on the deck and although uninjured, was in quite a bit of pain as he was reprimanded by his adult. I thought, “just what I need, to be wiped out by a kid in a high speed scooter crash”. One more step, and I would have been in his crash zone. Wet slippery wood deck, no handrails, cliffs to fall off of. In hindsight, it was a bizarre place
Twice, down on the deck by the water, I thought people were talking to me, and I turned around, but I didn’t know them and they weren’t looking at me as they walked by.
i stayed 20 or 30 minutes, walking around the place half a dozen times, not seeing anyone. I left, disappointed, because I was really really REALLY looking forward to hanging out with some people and maybe making some friends out of some acquaintences. I got a soda from a waitress at the back of the bar who didn’t charge me. I leaned on an empty railing near there and sent my messages.
I left, thinking maybe it was cancelled via Facebook or something and I didn’t get the message.
The next morning, nightmare, the responses to my previous nights messages started coming in. My main contact arrived 8 minutes after I left. Everybody was there. I was told they saw me, walking around. Wondered why I didn’t come over. I was told the woman who the party was for said I made eye contact with her, and just walked on by. (Does this correspond with my perception of the people who walked by me?) I was also told they were at the back of the bar, the only placed I paused. That’s where I sent my messages from and got the soda, the rest of the time there, I was walking around. I didn’t recognize anybody.
Apparently, I was stressed (putting it mildly) about going alone. According to theory derived from the last year of counseling, I was operating on the amygdala, the lizard brain, no sensory information getting past it to the rest of my brain.
According to my counselor, I have spent a lot of my life trapped there. Brain unnecessarily stuck in fight or flight mode.This is the first time I’ve been aware of it though, albeit in hindsight.
Anyway life goes on, I haven’t seen anybody from there yet. (not that I’m aware of anyway, ha ha) I will today. I feel like now I have a reputation as a crazy person at the place I hoped would be a source of new friends.
Saturday and Sunday were great tho!
