Broken

A couple weeks ago, I wrote a post on a popular website.  The post intended to draw people (read that as men) into pure and candid conversation, without the intent of sexual consummation.  The response was tepid, as expected.  Of the 5-6 responses, three devolved into conversations about the weather, one went straight to sex talk, and another never responded after my initial response.  The question this brings to my mind is why do I do this to myself? 

I am in therapy.  Many of you that know me are already aware, but for the few that are not, there it is.  In my quest for understanding the irrational aspect of human nature, emotions, I challenge myself to put it out there, so to speak, in order to try to reach at least a friendly rapport with another human that does not live in the same house as me.  In an attempt to open a door, I put two such ads out there.  In the first ad, I mentioned several things that interested me and purposefully left out things like my age, economic situation, and emotional issues.  In the second, I included that everyone has issues and included my age (economic status is nobody’s business anyway).  As expected, I got several responses from the first ad, and not one from the second. 

My original thesis consisted of the idea that men, even platonically, were not interested in chatting with a person that had obvious issues or age.  The results support my thesis.   The guys that responded to the first ad were after three or more e-mails, given access to my blog, which has a lot of information about who I am as a person and some ideological discussions.  The result of that part of the experiment surprised me.  Even after establishing a light rapport with the people, disclosure of the issues—in this case giving access to the webpage—resulted in termination of the communication (or at least so far).  Given that the experiment is still ongoing, I do not expect any more communications from any person. 

To clarify, issues I have stem from a very dominant and homophobic father, forcing me to assume an alter ego for the sole purpose of acceptance.  Over the years, constantly covering my sexuality and “pretending” to be someone else has resulted in me not having any tolerance for hiding or pretending to be someone, I am not.  However, aware as I am, that details can be omitted without sacrificing integrity, scarring has caused me to not hold back anything in order to bring about full disclosure.  I understand that this flaw can cause me to not develop a healthy relationship in the future, while at the same time, nothing short of full disclosure will satisfy my incessant need for integrity.  Therein, lays the problem. 

Perhaps patience, persistence, and time will vindicate me.  Mayhap there is a person out there somewhere that understands that flaw (and others as well) and still wants to have at least discourse with me.  Until then, I hold my head up high and wave my broken flag in hopes that someone out there can look past the broken parts and see the intelligence within.