Let me tell you the story of a boomer, 61, and the clusterfuck life that never made me fit in.
My dad was in jail for embezzlement the day I was born in 1958 in Turkey. My mom may have been his whore. They divorced when I was 6. Those first 6 years, we moved a lot, skipping out on rent. After their divorce, I attended 4 schools in Grade 1. Then I was sent to Germany to be with my dad who had immigrated there. The next 3 years, I spent in several more schools plus a horrible year at a boarding school/orphanage. Then back to mom in Turkey for 5 months. Born a tall blue eyed blonde kid in a land of shorted dark haired dark eyed people, I was always an outcast.
Summer of 1968, sent to NYC to be with dad who had immigrated there now. Skinny pasty white blonde kid, we lived in the Stapleton district of Staten Island, where pretty much everyone was black. Got my ass kicked too many times to recall. Then 3 years later, sent to Canada to be with mom and step dad who had immigrated there.
All in all, 15 schools in 4 countries in 9 years. I never fit in. Also, above average IQ and hyper-vigilance where I would spot any anomaly. In high school, everyone knew everyone. I was once again the outsider who spoke a terrible NYC black ghetto dialect. Worst acne you could imagine, plus alcoholic narcissistic mom and angry at the world and everything and everyone in it stepdad, no friends were allowed in THEIR house, so I kept to myself.
Finished high school, then college, met someone, got married at 25. Small town Canadian family, because I didn't talk the talk of beer, hockey, sports, trucks and other mundane lowbrow rural chatter, I was shunned. 25 years later the marriage finally ended.
Several failed relationships for which I will take the blame, take the fall. It wasn't that I said or did anything bad. There was no violence or abuse, no drugs and theft or cheating, no, it was because when in a social gathering with my partner and her family/friends, the smalltalk that took place, I never fit in. They all have this peculiar way of talking. a strange dialect of simpletons. Plus the general topics they talk about are beyond boring, simple and idiotic, always about how much they drunk, smoked up, got broke, sports and who hit who and got arrested.
The people who are capable of better conversation, more intellectual, I don't fit into their world either because I am not of their class. So, stuck in limbo, not part of the country of my birth or residence, I never fit in.
Today, I have my 2 sons, 26 and 32, who rarely call me because they were turned against me from a lifetime of deception and lies by their mother who never matured past the age of 12.
When the marriage ended, my friends all scattered, as no one wants to invite a single man to any events or social gatherings.
Bottom line, if you didn't fit in at 10, 20, 30, it doesn't get easier. I read some of the "rah rah get out there" replies from privileged life dipshits who have an uninformed opinion on everything. It doesn't work that way. If we were capable of climbing out of this hole, don't you think we would have by now?
Not fitting in, the loneliness is the worst. People shun you because after they hear you say 3 sentences that isn't like what the herd says, they won't have anything to do with you.
Fuck you dad, fuck you mom, and fuck you ex wife and ex girlfriends. All I wanted was to be loved, to be held, to be cared for, the same way I loved, held and cared for you. All I wanted was to be taken seriously, to matter to you, to belong to and have a family. I tried my best, I did the only thing I knew how.
Shunning and rejecting someone for being different takes no effort.
To understand and respect and allow someone who doesn't fit in, into your life takes hard work and commitment.
Today, whenever I encounter someone weird that others walk away from, I talk to them, laugh with them, help them best I can. because they are me, they are many of us.