And on the Personal Front

ACG is my new best friend. This is the best thing to happen in a while, people wise at least. My best assessment for the situation is that this is my year to make tons of friends, perhaps influence people, and build foundation for the final break from my family. It is clear that I will never measure up to their expectations, no matter the rational for said expectations. Verta keeps telling me that I can't live by an other's sword as easily as die by it. Now that I understand this, the ability is being given me.
I have always maintained that none of us can live totally isolated from the world, even if we find the pain of it completely unbearable. And I am supported in that belief by the way my community life is shaping up. First, the new job. I have made tons of good friends there and I feel very good about who I am. Second, in my interactions with stores I frequent, I have made good connections. I can have conversations with the barista's beyond just the tip manifesting chit chat. Third, having gone on line, I have connected with some pretty amazing people, ACG chief among them. With this year being a reunion year, I have been able to reconnect with some people that, as would happen, I missed out on in school because of my fear of further torment. And of course, Verta's group continues to expand my circles. In short, the upside of this crazy machine, is that the world has opened up in ways that I would never have imagined two months ago.
And that is something that I think will continue to be a theme in my life this year, and in the lives of many of my friends, old and new. G'd does amazing things when we let him. The biggest obstacle He faces is our belief that we are worth His blessings. Believe people. Believe. Believe and receive.