I am ambivalent about what I think about this.  It is not necessarily a depression post, but a relational and social post and I am curious to know what people think.  Over the past few years I've been trying to expand my social network beyond a couple of sort of insulated friend groups. My girlfriend group tends to be a bit insulated, they don't care to go out, socialize as singles and meet men to date, or just to go out and socialize. It's mostly alone at our homes.  I feel stifled by it. It is what it is.

It looked like I needed to expand my friend network to include people who like to socialize, go to events, concerts, etc. I'll admit it's been difficult.  Work really does not provide a whole lot in terms of social contact.  I have been part of a graduate group at university which is OK, but everyone there is acquaintances.  At church everyone is far older than me. The only viable place has been the singles meetups that I go to. The only other thing that I can think of is friends of friends.

Over the past 3-4 years or so, I've had a couple of hangouts with nice ladies from the singles' groups that have just fizzled after one or two times. One was looking for a romantic relationship, but I only date men.  Anyway, I finally found someone to hang with, and we've been hanging out close to a year.  It's been nice, we hang out every six or eight weeks or so. I had someone to call when I wanted to go to see music, and someone to call over Halloween.  Maybe I have a tendency to have an anxious attachment or something, I don't know, but it occurred to me that I've known her close to a year now and I don't know her last name. Not a huge thing but it just struck me as a bit odd.  Everyone else I hang out with I have on my social media and I know their full names.  Most of them we've been to each others' homes.  Not always though.  There was this sense that she was sort of anonymous.  It started to feel weird.  I don't like to be pushy, but I was rather curious.

I ran into her last weekend at one of the singles' meetups.  She was just at my friends' party the weekend before.  We got to talking and I asked her whether she was on social media, facebook in this case, and I volunteered my last name.  I did not ask her for hers. The next thing that happened was kind of odd. She just stared at me for a really long time with this vacant, blank stare. I was getting uncomfortable.  The night wore on and the club was kind of busy and loud. We got separated and I drove home.  Later it struck me how odd that seemed.  Did she think I was doing to doxx her or something? Did she have something to hide?

A couple of times I've invited her to get togethers with my friends, and she came.  Even then, her behavior struck me as kind of odd.  For a grown woman with two grown kids and a responsible career she seemed very ill at ease.  She could not hold her own in the conversation. After I introduced her to my friends, who are very nice people, she just sort of fell apart. She started figeting quite a bit and left very early. My friends were perplexed by it.  When I saw her at the singles' mixer last week a man approached us to engage us in conversation, which is typical of those events.  I was nice to him but I thought she was pretty rude to him, not making eye contact and turning away.  She darted off. So strange. Everyone wants to feel welcome at these events. I used to have a whole lot of social anxiety and at times would act that way. I took a virtual conversation course and it helped me improve my skills. 

I felt very uncomfortable when I told her my last name after almost a year of knowing her. It felt weird and disconnected, sort of like, "lights are on but nobody is home."  Yesterday I texted her about something random. Someone in my network wants to fix up a nice guy, and they wanted to know if I knew someone.  I know she's been looking, so I passed the info on to my friend. No response.

I don't know what to think. In the past when she evaded or didn't pick up the conversational ball with my friends, I sort of thought maybe I should let the whole thing drop. Now I really feel that way.  I get uncomfortable with people when they are so unsure of themselves that I have to do all of the social work. Plus I don't want to be doing all the work in any given relationship. When people are evasive I feel very disconnected from them. Unless I am paranoid maybe she is hiding something.  Unless I'm too pushy what is the big deal?  Very much arm's length.