Maybe this is what happens to women when we have a mid-life crisis. Maybe I've been in the middle of a mid-life crisis for years and was once again the only one who didn't see it.

I realized last night that I am out of place. That I don't "fit" any place in the physical world. I dont' fell like I have anything in common with women my age. I don't know many women my age agonizing over their calc homework... And I don't have alot in common with the boys in my program. I believe only 1 or 2 of them had been born when I graduated High School... Sometimes I think I have more in common with teenaged boys than women my age.. I'd much rather be playing video games than doing my homework.

But I don't look like most other women my age, I don't do the sorts of things they are doing, my family sure doens't look like theirs... I'm happy with who I am, happy with what I am, as a general rule. Of course, but again, I compair my journey with theirs...

Of course, I realize that I have always felt like that, no matter what age I was. In the 5th grade all the girls were ga-ga about Donny Osmond and it was all I could to do keep from calling them idiots. (like Donny Osmond or David Cassidy was going to come to our little school and sweep them off their feet... People are arrested for that sort of thing, and rightly so...)

I don't know, maybe I'm starting to be depressed ... Of course, I think I always get this way when I have to come back to Idaho. It just surves to highlight how alien I am here.

I just spent my 3rd of 6 wedding aniversaries away from my husband. Next year, he's going to take vacation so he can spend it with me.

Anyway, thanks for listening. Anyone else feel like they are out of place? Are we actually all out of place together?

Oh my gosh, Vine. I feel like I'm a complete alien from the rest of the world. I could have written this: "I realize that I have always felt like that, no matter what age I was. In the 5th grade all the girls were ga-ga about Donny Osmond and it was all I could to do keep from calling them idiots. (like Donny Osmond or David Cassidy was going to come to our little school and sweep them off their feet..."

I've always felt that way but I attributed it towards the fact that I started my period when I was 17, so I figured maybe my hormones didn't kick in like theirs did, which is why I never understood why all the girls had crushes on guys they had no chance with.

I don't even know how to respond to this, but I'm so very, very much in the same boat as you, I just fake it better.

I'm too tall, too fat, size 11 feet, paranoid-schitzophrenic mother and asshole alcoholic father (who I didn't meet till I was 18.) I've got frizzy hair, I'm 100% Polish, never went to prom or had dates, abusive childhood. I'm the biggest girl I know (taking into consideration feet, bone structure, height and weight) and I've never been able to buy a pair of shoes in a normal store or clothes either. It's been a hard, hard life, which is why it's so important for me to add color and enthusiasm. I don't have time for blah anything! Don't worry about what others think, there are more of us aliens around than you know.

Don't worry, we'll have some fun next weekend and you'll see that you fit in just perfect in this group.

Yeah, our lives seem to run parallel, don't they? I was days away from being 16 before I got mine.

My son wanted to know what my prom was like. This is the boy that went to prom last year with a boy and a girl, and this year went to prom with two girls.... He couldn't believe that I didn't go to prom...

Part of my problem is that is want to be a boy. Not sexually, but gender. I was always much more interested in playing with boy toys that girl toys. My entire life, boy toys are so much more interesting than girl toys. Take make-up for instance... I really am only interested in it if I get to make it look like a zombie or something weird. I've only ever been interested in "man" jobs. I want man pay, I want man regocniton. One of the classes here sort of summed it up... some little mormon boy who'd never met anyone quite like me said "Wow, I've never met a woman who demanded the respect due a man."

Aliens unite!

Yep - I always hated that smarmy little Donny Osmand. Nobody was ever really that good, were they?

I was one of two "fat girls" in my class. I went to high school in Joseph, Oregon and my graduating class was 33 people. Talk about alien. I had come from the sunny shores of Santa Cruz, CA and been dropped into the back woods of Oregon. Not only did the girls dream of ridiculously distant boy-stars, but they dreamed of getting married at 18 to the star of the football team (whose main goal in life was to get a job with his dad at the mill) and having lots of children. They actually DID that.

I think it has something to do with the proximity to Idaho. Maybe it just causes massive depression... LOL.

Anyway, I think we ARE all out of place together.

I don't have anything to say to most people. I don't have children of my own. My DH's daughter is only 8 yrs younger than I am so it's hard to think of her as my child. I can't commisurate about night feedings and diapers... I work in the Mortgage industry, which is alien to all except other Mortgage people. I love computer games - and dorky science fiction television like Star Trek. (Yeah, baby. James T. Kirk - now there was a REAL man).

Shopping is like WAR - and War is Hell - it takes strategy and determination to find something that fits that doesn't make you look like a complete idiot or a sack of potatoes. Make-up is strictly utilitarian - not to be ooohed and ahhed over. DH is a house spouse - and I never cook... one more Woman thing I know nothing about.

So, what do you talk about? Sex is pretty much taboo. Politics is too dangerous for polite society. I find myself observing, a lot. It's like Lurking in real life. (Vines, GO to VEGAS).

I think everybody must feel this way to various degrees. Everybody really IS somebody else's wierdo (sorry, I can't recall who had that as her signature quote - but it's a good one).

There's no cure except to accept that we are all aliens and embrace the strangeness.

At least here, we all have a common bond.

I never did fit the mold. I'm unique. And that's the way I want it!

:alien :alien :alien :alien

You are certainly not alone, you've got more company than you could possibly ever want.

Not only did I not have a crush on Donny Osmond, I spent all of my time trying to figure out why couldn't I look like Marie???? She had it all, the looks, the personality, the talent, the money, she had it all I say. Eventually she ended up with the depression too. So sad, I think it has something to do with the Estrogen or that gene that determines boy or girl.

Me, I have no more estrogen, hyster sister for ten years now, and the only girl in my family, besides my mom. So the tomboy thing has always been more my style, I use to climb into the tree house all the time growing up and throughly loved it.

Don't get me wrong, on a sexual basis, I do prefer men, if I'm in the mood, which is practically never, thanks to the antidepressants. You'd think they would crank it up, not put it out.

Sighhhhh! So sorry to hear that you're feeling so blue. But if it helps, at 49 years old I too am studying for a new career. I know I should be preparing for retirement, but until I can afford it I still have to work and since I got laid off, I figure I might as well do something I enjoy.

Please take care of yourself. I have enjoyed your posts more than anyone elses, although everyone is so caring, there's something about your sense of humor that really makes me laugh out loud. So for that alone, I thank you.

Cindy

You know what "normal" people who fit in are?

I'll give ya a hint: BAAAA-BAAAA

I'm having real trouble seeing you as a sheep Vines. OF COURSE you don't fit in! So you have a little angst now and then, the pain is worth it if it keeps you from being boring. (And we all know, boring you are NOT.)

CHin up, kiddo. Revel in your Otherness.

Which reminds me... guess what I did this past sweltering SoCal weekend? After I moved the bed, took the mirrors off the wall, draped the dresser and put plastic on the floor? Stripped down to my birthday suite and painted my bedroom STARK NAKED! It was incredibly liberating. I highly recommend it. Yep, revel in your otherness, then (take the mirrors down--let's get real here) and revel in your nakedness!

I dont' fell like I have anything in common with women my age

Vines I can relate to this..I have no women friends, all of my friends are men. I read the sports page everyday and watch ESPN where as the other women I know read Vogue or Glamour Magazine and watch Nip & Tuck

I got to baseball games where the other women go shopping at Nordstrom's

But I can tell you one thing I am happier then all of them.

We all fit in this world in our own little way, each of us gives something to this world that others don't.

Honestly I think most of us here felt like we never fit in..I think it is more from being the fat kid all of our lives not from our likes & dislikes ...ignorant people all of our lives never gave us the chance to feel like we fit in.

You fit in perfectly here Vines..we love you

Crystal you are not out of place, you are in your space. You are doing what you want to do. No regrets! You will be able to look back and say I did it, not I wish I had done it. You go for it girl. We only get 1 life so live it like you want to. Keep smiling and you will make it.

Vines, I think not feeling like we fit in was why a lot of us became overweight in the first place. food doesn't judge us, it numbs us from feeling so alone.

I liked David Cassidy, but what about Bobby Sherman? I wonder what ever happened to him.

I can't imagine how much fun a bunch of wierdos like us would have with a few pitchers of margaritas, haha.

Back in my day ( :laugh ), it was Jonathan Brandis, Edward Furlong and the like. None of their pictures were in my locker or on my bedroom walls either. I don't even swoon for Brad Pitt either.

I had teal hair my senior year too. I think maybe I was trying NOT to fit in... or something. I don't have any friends that I hang out with currently in "real life". I work with my family and my boyfriend, and live with my boyfriend and haven't really bothered with much else. Last weekend I saw someone of the people I went to high school with, and while I was glad to have seen them, I was glad to not have kept in close contact with them.

I guess just a different set of reasons why I'm part of the "Out of Place" group too. We're not out of place, just in our own place

Vines, I think not feeling like we fit in was why a lot of us became overweight in the first place. food doesn't judge us, it numbs us from feeling so alone.

I liked David Cassidy, but what about Bobby Sherman? I wonder what ever happened to him.

You are right, of course. Food doesn't judge. It simply provides succor and solance.

I've never had teal hair. But I did have blue for a while. it was very pretty, but didn't last very long. No, I've had purple hair for so long, I was actually know as "the purple haired lady" at one place I worked. I sort of feel like it's my natural color. Partly because I'd always admired the little old ladies who had lavender or pink hair. I didn't want to wait until I was a little old lady before I had blue hair.

But partly, I hate to be ignored. Part of the wolves thing. It is amazingly hard to ignore someone with fushia hair, let alone a 250 pound woman with fushia hair. One who's also capable of being amazingly loud.

And now for your offical Bobby Sherman update...

Well, it looks like Bobby is a cop... http://www.bobbysherman.com/ Bobby is going to have to get a bigger wallet to hold his newest badge. He was sworn in friday as a full fledged San Bernardino Country Sheriff. He will be teaching CPR and First Aid classes.

You know what "normal" people who fit in are?

I'll give ya a hint: BAAAA-BAAAA

Which reminds me... guess what I did this past sweltering SoCal weekend? After I moved the bed, took the mirrors off the wall, draped the dresser and put plastic on the floor? Stripped down to my birthday suite and painted my bedroom STARK NAKED! It was incredibly liberating. I highly recommend it. Yep, revel in your otherness, then (take the mirrors down--let's get real here) and revel in your nakedness!

Well, when I'm in line for a movie, I almost always feel compelled to start 'baaaa-ing" ... once when I went to try out for a part as an extra in some movie... I started "mooing" in the line. I thought it was funny...

Paining starkers! That really give a new twist to the old classic nude painting. Performance art? Are you going to post a pix of that on the "artist and their artwork thread" then? I can't imagine painting a room starkers. For one thing I'd need to do something with my boobs... it just wouldnt' work. hmmm, perhaps it would give some interesting texture to the paint. *squish*

"Wow, I've never met a woman who demanded the respect due a man."

Holy mud, Vine... if you only knew how much trouble I get into because my husband tells me to stop acting like a man! I'm very girly and don't like boy stuff at all, yuck (except my motorcycle, which hubby keeps clean and running.) But as far as attitude, don't NO man get in my way.

I recently had an enormous fight with the head of the Welding School at the Local 525 Union, a friend of hubby's. When Bob says "jump" the entire union jumps to command, and his wife obeys every word. I told him to F-off and he went ballistic. Everyone thought he was going to kill me because "nobody talks to Mr. N. that way!" Bullship, I do! He told me I had to respect him at three different levels, first cause he's a man, second cause he's older, but most important is because he killed in the war to protect MY country. I told him to F-off and said I'd have done the same thing for my country if I was called to war. I told him he has to earn respect from me if he wants any. I honestly thought he was going to end up in jail after beating the crap out of me, but a couple days later he asked me to lunch. He told me I struck nerves that nobody has touched before. He had never met a woman that had so much "man" in her. The severe hatred he had for me eventually earned me a great amount of respect, and now we have a very tight bond and a very special friendship. He's hard as nails and gets out of line too often, but I'm always there to slap him down to Earth, and he's always there to tell me that even though men hate me for acting that way, that he admires me because he's never met a woman that could take down any man. I'm not saying I could protect myself against any guy, all I'm saying is that I'll go down kicking, screaming and scratching before any man gets the better of me.

Vine, this comes from our being forced into independence at an early age. We didn't have anyone to protect us or raise us, so we ended up as fighters. Woof.

Wow. I hear a lot of the same things that I have felt/feel. I had purple/blue/bright red hair, and I have only 1 friend here, whom I rarely am around, I might ad. I admire how men relate to each other, and have had more men friends in the past than women. Now I only have the one woman friend here.

I don't know many other 30 YO whose heart's desire is to serve the Lord. My goal in life is to be a missionary. All of the other 30 YO here want to do drugs and drink and party, even if they do have kids, a mortgage, and are married. No thanks, I think I'll pass. Been there done that when I was younger, and it got me only pain and suffering. I think I'll stick with desiring to help people, love them, and lift them up.

I've been called weird by others all of my teenage and adult life, but that's ok with me. I'd rather be weird and unique like I am, then try to fit the world's mold of what is normal on any given day.

I've finally just realized that being me is ok, I love my life, and I love who God has created me to be. There is no one else like me, and only I can choose to fulfill the calling that I have on my life.

Life is good.

Crystal,

oh yes! I am definately in this club.

another great thread due to your gifted insight. You are so very special!