Feeling Disconnected: quietirony — LiveJournal

I'm not sure whether anyone will ever come across this Live Journal, and that's ok... I had just about forgotten about it until last night when Dan Goldman, the illustrator for Shooting War, spoke of his Activate project which currently lives in the land of Live Journal. It's been over a year since I last posted to my LJ, and it only seems approriate at this point in my life to return to this venue. My videoblog, The Revolution WIll Be Televised, has actually picked up a fair share of viewers, it's not a forum for me to talk about my life -- at least not from an introspective perspective -- so I think I may return to posting here. To be honest, the entries here will probably consist of a lot of bitching, banal anecdotes, and me bemoaning my own existence; if you want to be informed, entertained, or updated on the developments in my life -- then please visit: www.joshwolf.net Throughout my life I've battled with this sort of syndrome which leaves me feeling disconnected. It's as if the entire world were a keyboard and I'm the "j" key which mysteriously seems to stick from time to time -- unable to make conact. Sure, sometimes you can put a little effort into it and the "j" will clack away flawlessly for a while; but, at other times, no matter how much you massage the key beneath your fingers and work at making contact, the "j" just refuses to connect. Last night's party to celebrate Shooting War was one of those moments when this self-described syndrome got the better of me. Not to say that I didn't meet anyone interesting or have worthwhile conversations -- as I recall, there were two. But for the past few weeks, since vloggercon, I guess; I've sensed this inability to connect with the people around me percolating and growing stronger. Vloggercon was an amazing experience, and it was electrifying to spend so much time with so many cool people, but once it was over and everyone packed up and went home I found myself feeling very much alone and cut off. As I began feeling more disconnected, I became depressed and this in turn left me feeling more disconnected, and like any good negative feedback loop, I found myself trapped in this cycle with no glowing EXIT sign anywhere in sight. It all came to a head at last night's party. Other than a couple of good conversations, I found myself nursing beer after beer throughout the night, trying to initiate communication and failing miserably. With each successive beer, I was hoping that I'd find myself in a space where I could interface with the people around me, or at least feel better about my social isolation. Instead, each drink had the opposite effect, and as I cracked open the fourth drink of the night, I realized that I should've just kept my money and call it a night. This wasn't going to work. And so I finished this last beer quicker than the ones that came before it, but still found myself debating whether the best approach would be to just abandon my this half-finished beer or if that would constitute alcohol abuse, never mind the fact that finishing the beer for the sake of finishing it is probably abuse in and of itself. But I wasn't about to leave a task incomplete and quickly chugged down my beer and began my journey home feeling more like an alien trying to fit in on a foreign planet than the man who finally felt like he found a place he belonged after fleaing like a refuge from Southern California. I don't really know what the point of that whole story was, but writing it was a bit cathartic and a hell of a lot cheaper than a therapist...