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Notes -
She didn't say "all us freaks have as each other," that's a line from Hellboy, her favorite film, and also one of my favorites. I'm the one with the identity based around weirdness, which I assumed she also had. I intuited that line would have meaning for her, which is why I wrote it in the inside cover of the Hellboy trade paperback I gave her, which she noticed. The line isn't in the books, it's a very Del Toro sentiment. It's me expressing my sense of betrayal.
I actually do believe that she's neurodivergent, in addition to whatever other conditions she has. We can smell our own. I'm also an aimless adrift 30something.
She's not lonely. She's surrounded by cringe leftist queer activists, orbiters, and whatever a crush is, which I presume is the guy she bangs when she occasionally feels like it.
As someone who’s struggled with “I’m weird and that makes me cool,” I learned the hard way that the best thing you can do for yourself is to develop the ability to bridge your personality and values to normies. Making yourself a permanent outcast just perpetuates feelings of ostracization. I know you feel like an outsider, but I assure you that from your posts, you’re much more relatable and typically human than you think.
Even in your hypothetical rant, you’re attributing to her thoughts and values that she didn’t share. “Whatever happened to the Hellboy quote that I put in the book”, in that context, doesn’t sound like the description of a betrayal — it sounds like you’re upset she isn’t actually what you imagined her to be. You’re accusing her of betraying your perception of her.
That’s why she reacted so harshly to the kissing: you were a fun buddy to her, not a romantic interest. Unfortunately, she seems to have a big problem with actually vocalizing her thoughts and needs, and either accidentally or intentionally flirting as a form of social bonding, which is why you get anger only in texts. It’s genuinely possible that this is the dark side of my anecdote about asexuals not understanding the difference between sexuality and friendship — maybe she honestly doesn’t realize some of actions are clearly flirting, just sees people responding positively and so it’s positively reinforced.
Everything else makes sense and doesn’t seem like BPD or even craziness when I think of it that way: the “friend hug,” the invitation to hang out but aversion to dinner (which would be a date!), and the cold shoulder. I’m not sure she ever thought of you as a potential partner. Maybe she flirted in ways that were honestly ambiguous, but you’re both neurodivergent — are you certain she was acting and you were reading social signals correctly?
I’m still trying to solve the mystery of why I never ended up in a situation like this, and have had generally positive romantic experiences. Probably what I would have done with this girl is awkwardly ask her out in explicit terms, she would awkwardly say no, and even our friendship would fizzle out. I don’t make grand romantic gestures and I only rarely flirt first.
I guess I’m lucky that occasionally women have made their interest known explicitly, and understandably women who’ve liked me enough to go out of their way to make me know it had little trouble with ambiguous interest or attraction. Looking back on your initial thread, I realize I’m basically implementing @gorge’s advice: “It's easier if you go for the girls who are crushing on you, without you having to put in extraordinary effort.” What’s really tough is if you don’t have anyone crushing on you. But women who clearly state their attraction to a man don’t realize how powerful and important they are in the current social context.
I’m sorry if I made you feel judged. My goal was solely to try and relate to your experience and reassure you. I guess I overstepped. But I do think after reflecting that this isn’t a case of “crazy feminism ruins good romantic prospect,” I think it’s that you made a geeky friend and misread her friendship as attraction. I’ve done that many times, and probably would have in this situation, too. It’s very relatable.
It would have saved you both a lot of drama if you’d have clarified your relationship before you kissed her. The current social environment just makes ambiguity too threatening to everyone.
"Pretty people don't light their own cigarettes." This was not a necessary thing to say.
Also, the time to say "I'm not happy with you kissing me" was the first time I kissed her, not the next day
I am not mad she wasn't attracted to me, I'm mad that I'm being accused of wrongdoing, rather than this just being an incident of mutual misunderstanding between two awkward people. I knew I was going out on a limb pursuing her.
Also, "all us freaks have is each other" is the entire fucking ethos of her queer neurodivergent activist leftist community, except that it specifically excludes me as a straight white male. Yes, I was disappointed to find I was wrong about her.
You're taking me a bit too literally here, or really under-selling my self-awareness.
Alright, I'll quit while I'm behind. Best of luck to you.
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