Transient Man

My recent life upheaval is odd. Here I am, hating change but going through a change that is huge, and doing it voluntarily. At these times I always think back to my diagnosis when it was put to me that I had actually moved a few times, and for someone with Asperger's Syndrome (AS) that is unusual. I said that sometimes you just have to do what you have to do...and now is one of those times. Am I hating every second? Yes. Am I feeling incredibly anxious, worried and fearful? Yes. But, like going to the dentist, I know these are short-term concerns and within a month, two maximum, I'm sure I'll be over it and back to normal.

The strange thing is that when people hear what I'm doing they say things like "that's really brave", "what a big change", "I couldn't do that" and so on. I don't know if they're being polite saying these things, or if they mean them. When I think about it rationally...I'm in my late thirties having lived at a location for 6 years yet I can drop an entire life at the drop of a hat. Is that why people think I am being "brave"? Are they judging my life by their own standards? Are they thinking about what it must be like to leave all the friends and family behind? The upheaval of relocating with their partner, and children, to a new place?

The truth of the matter, of course, is that for me none of these things are an issue. I'm in my late thirties, I have been here 6 years yet have no friends, family or partner. I have nothing and no-one to miss. I am a totally transient human being. A bum with a car and a flat. The things I am stressing about are if I'll find a comic shop and a gym. My mother said to me that I'll have to "start over" and "make new friends". New friends?

I suppose, at a stretch, you could consider this a positive aspect of having AS.

Shields recharging

You know when you're playing a game like Halo (or most any similar game that came after it) and you get hit so often that your shields are gone and you have to hide somewhere safe to let them recharge, as any more hits will have serious consequences for you? That's how I'm feeling right now.

Within the not-too-distant past I had reached quite a stable, and fairly high, level of contentment. I had really come to accept a lot of things and I was actually quite happy within myself. I was in as good as place as someone like me could ever be in.

My recent relationship, and subsequent events I don't want to immortalise as I couldn't bare to look, has scattered everything to the winds. I am now in total disarray, questioning everything. I have once again seem a glimpse of how other people live and once again I am cowering in fear and despair. I have taken a step back from a lot of things in my life for now, some quite important things. But I feel I need to hide. I need to wait until those shields recharge. I need to get back in a place when I am once more happy inside myself, with myself, but it is going to be an empty happiness. The happiness of a recluse, shut off from everything.

The Joy of Nothing

One thing that the analysis of my life has revealed is that I get pleasure from nothing. I simply exist. My life goes on from day to day. Today at work was a big company meeting that everyone laughed their way through and I sat there stony-faced. After work everyone hurried down to the pub, and I went and stood there stony-faced, on the peripheral. People must enjoy this stuff. They must get pleasure from the basic interaction they have with other people. It certainly can't be the conversation as that is functional and bland. Boring.

I can watch a mediocre show on Television and stay the distance, why can't I stand mediocre social gatherings? I guess it is because it is a constant slap in the face for me. A constant reminder of the normality that I will never know. The joys people get in such simple things that will forever elude me, making my life ultimately meaningless.

I stay for one drink (a "social" one...ha!) then head home. I stop by the alcohol shop on the way back because, truth be known, I don't even enjoy my own company. I hate being with other people and I hate being on my own, so drunken oblivion is my only realistic option.

Nothing to fear

I called it off with that girl I was seeing, so I am once more single and once more not getting any younger.

I think this is the first time I've ever really called off a relationship. I know I had only been seeing her about 4 months, but what is significant is that I didn't let the fear of being alone stop me. I looked at the relationship with honest eyes, and asked myself questions like "Are you happy?" "Does this person behave in a way you can tolerate?" I didn't go as far as making a "pro" and "con" list like they do on TV, but I weighed things up nonetheless and came to my decision.

Was it hard? Yes. Is it hard? Yes. Do I feel bad? Yes? Lonely? Yes. Do I have regrets? Sometimes...yes. Does part of me still wish I was in a relationship? Yes. Do I see hard times ahead? Yes. Do I think that maybe this was my last chance at having a relationship? Yes. Am I scared I will now be single forever? Yes. Am I happy now? No. Time heals all wounds though...and the most important thing in all of this is that for the first time I didn't let fear control me.

So where did this strength come from? I think it came from the fact that I am now finally comfortable with myself, my strengths and my weaknesses. And that has all come from my diagnosis.

Twirling round with this familiar parabol

Everything is different now. I'm sort of seeing someone, kind of. It's early days and I'd long forgotten what these early stages are like. I'm suffering a lot from anxiety and worry. It's like I've turned into a needy child, craving reassurance like mother's milk. If hours go by without me hearing from her I start to wonder if she is going off me. She doesn't help in herself, as she isn't always the regular contact type person. When she does contact me it is always positive and seems to lift my anxiety, but that anxiety gradually returns.

It's not just my separation anxiety, but spending time with someone normal, bring around them and listening to them talk - it all reminds me of my inadequacies. My insular, lonely little life filled with unfulfilment. It's akin to learning to like yourself and then someone holding up a mirror, reminding you just how ugly you actually are. One step forward, two steps back.

I was drinking at the weekend too and I'm shocked at the effect it is having on my mental health. My anxiety today was through the roof. Off the chart. Depression too, thoughts of worthlessness and despair. Wondering just what the fucking point is. I don't know if it is affecting me this badly because I don't drink for long periods of time, or if I'm just changing as a person, rotting away.

I'm considering going to the doctor to see if I can get some kind of anti-anxiety medication.

Velocity

It's that time of year again; it's not only coming but accelerating. In January I jumped off a very tall building and have been telling myself "so far so good, so far so good" but now the ground is in sight and it's coming up fast. I'm going to hit it hard.

There is an acquaintance I usually spend some of Christmas day with, or at least have lunch and maybe a drink with, it helps the day go by, helps me feel normal. I am standing still, though, and like everyone else he is moving and is now married and living with his wife and they are going away for Christmas this year. So for the first time in maybe 10 odd years I'll literally be on my own for Christmas. The longest day of the year.

I'm in training for it already, I'm regularly attending the gym and regularly not drinking. I'm back on the wagon so that the inevitable fall isn’t so bad. This year I firmly intend the entire day to drown in an alcoholic daze.

Although I suspect it's not just going to be Christmas itself that is the problem. I've kinda got involved-ish with a girl and I won't go into details but needless to say it's my usual modus operandi. It's another long-distance thing, another girl I've managed to woo with words. I've been to visit to her and mustered all of my efforts to fraudulently appear as normal as I can. To be honest I don't find it that hard to maintain normality for an evening with people I like and haven’t seen for a long time (I had a list of things to talk about pre-prepared on my phone's "To do" list that I referred to through the night so that I'd have something for when she stopped driving the conversation - there's a little tip for you).

For a week after meeting her I was in a pretty bad hole. Depression featuring heavily through my days and drinking through my nights. I felt like I was grieving for something but I don't know what. Meeting her made me feel normal I guess. Even if for just one night, and it was crushing me that I couldn't have that normality forever. In a way it was like I was playing a cruel joke on myself. A horrible bait and switch.

I've arranged to meet her again just before Christmas so I'll see if I can muster this sense of normality again or be faced with the fact that it was a fluke. I'll also see if I fall down a hole again afterward. I know it will be harder this time around, not only because my "To do" list was almost exhausted, but because I plan on telling her we can't really meet again. There are lots of reasons, not all of which I'll tell her...the main one is that there are reasons that will make any relationship between us too hard for both of us (she knows these reasons but it's something I can't really go into here, nothing related to my Aspergers). There is also the distance element. Plus the fact that I know she hasn't really seen the real me, and I think maybe I can quit while I'm ahead.

I also had to cancel my work's Christmas party to go and see her so that's that decided too. I just hope the meeting doesn't fall through due to the bad weather we're having at the moment.

I was telling a work colleague about this girl, the same one that gave me the previous ill-fated advice over my love life. He was frustrated about my negativity concerning this relationship, but he doesn't really understand. He asked me how old I was, and I told him. He asked me what I was doing, but I didn't understand so asked him to elaborate. "What are you doing with your life? You should be married with kids by now." No. He just doesn't understand.

Secret house against the world

There is an aspect of my Asperger's Syndrome (AS) that I still haven't come to terms with, or decided on how to handle. At work today there was a presentation at the end of the day at the local pub and when it was done everyone hung around and within moments the whole place was just like any other weekend view...everyone was chatting or waiting at the bar and smiling and mingling. There is a yearning in me to fit in, an aching almost. These opportunities don't come along often and I always tell myself to grasp them when they do. Here it was...and there was I...on the outside, not really knowing what to do with myself. Not really knowing how to inject myself anywhere, not knowing how to act or what to say. Not really wanting to either. As the chatting rose to white noise I did what I always do; I left to come home and be on my own.

I feel this constant jealousy and I'm not sure why. I don't enjoy socialising so why am I jealous? I don't really like talking to people so why do I care? It's like I'm a small child who only wants a certain toy because someone else is playing with it. I don't think it's the socialising I'm jealous of, I think I'm just grieving for normality. I see people be happy, I see people enjoy themselves and I think that's what I actually want. I don't really care what it is that they are doing that makes them happy, I just want to be happy too and this is how others seem to do it. Their lives all seem so full. My life is filled like darkness fills a room, like silence fills a forest.

I also know this girl I asked out is going to end up going out with someone else from work. They'll meet the way normal people meet, while socialising outside of work where hair is down and happiness high. That will just be another constant reminder of my failures.

This inability to handle group social situations is the last thread I'm hanging onto. I still keep trying it and I still keep failing. I don't know if one day I'll just officially give up and stop trying, I mean I might as well. But something inside me doesn't want to. It's almost like trying this is the last thing I have and turning my back on it means having turned my back on everything. There will be nothing left and I will have officially given up on life. Thrown in the towel. Admitted defeat.

Coming home today I resolved to not even attend this year's work Christmas Party... like the end is drawing near already. I know I still have some fight left, so I'm going to try and go to the Christmas Party and just hope it isn't the final nail in the coffin. I also mulled over my decision about not telling anyone about my AS. Sometimes I want to...but then I ask myself what good it will do and the answer is "probably none". I ask myself how I'll ever know unless I try? Ultimately though it always, always comes back to the same thing...information is one way - once you've told someone something you can't ever take that back. If I was to "come out" at work and there were downsides then I'm stuck with those downsides. It's just too important, this secret is something I can't afford to gamble with. Something people can just never know. I'll just continue to carry its crushing weight.

Butterflies and rocks

In my head I see the conversation we have in situations I lack the courage to engineer. I wait like a coward instead. Wait for the situation to occur naturally, of its own will as I lose mine and remain silent like a coward instead. You walk off to your life, I walk back to mine.

Call me Mr Nobody

It seems to me that conversations have different levels that are obtained in sequential order. When people initially meet, they grab the first rung of the ladder which is social chat; chit chat and the like. Nothing of any depth, just conversing about whatever. Like two boxers eyeing each other up in the ring…circling and throwing the odd, testing jab to see their opponent's form, style and reach. During this stage of conversation two people get a gauge for if they like each other and how much they enjoyed each other's conversation and general countenance.

If people are driven to spend enough time with each other, or if they just connect strongly enough, they move up to the next level of conversation where things are more meaningful. They may discuss on their opinions and views of things, now safe that their companion is sympathetic to their views. They may be more candid about their life situations, or they may discuss in detail about the things that interest them now they know their companion is reciprocal. As people tend to like people with similar interests there is more range of things they can talk about in a more in-depth manner. If sense of humour is similar then they can add a humorous angle to their experiences, or bring something into conversation purely down to the fact that they found it amusing. It is from these types of conversation that lasting friendship can spawn.

The thing about me, and I guess most people with Asperger's Syndrome, is that I am actually a socially boring person. I'm not a boring person, I can converse in-depth and with articulation and knowledge on many, many topics. I also have a pretty good sense of humour and can throw the odd joke or humorous observation into most topics. When it comes to the upper-rungs of the conversation ladder I can hold my own along with the best of them, I just can't handle that first step. If a stranger were to come up to me and attempt to spark up a conversation they'd soon find themselves frustrated and bored, as general meaningless chit-chat isn't something in my vocabulary.

As you can well imagine this is quite frustrating. I know I'm a fairly decent guy with a lot to offer, but no-one else does. Not through any fault of their own, but mine. I have things to say and discuss and talk about but no-one to really share my thoughts with. I realise I give off an impression to people that I'm curt and uninteresting and I suppose in these initial moments of meeting they're right…I am a socially uninteresting person.

Even though I can converse at those upper rungs of the ladder, I myself still can't instantly jump there. I can't approach a stranger, or have a stranger approach me, and converse on higher subjects right away; I too need that initial phase where you get comfortable with people, but for me that stage involves much less conversation :) So how do we get past that first rung of the ladder? How do we convince people to persevere with us? How can we drag them to our heights? If I had the answer I'd bottle it.

For me anyway, two things do help. First is working with people via your job. That way you're forced to be around each other and spend time with each other. In this captive situation you can conduct the "getting to know you" stage at your own pace. On-line situations also help where people tend to be in the same community due to a shared interest, and again you can get involved in a level you're comfortable with.

I mentioned the frustration before; having all these things inside you that you feel are going to waste. But the other aspect of frustration is when other people insist that you "just need to come out of your shell" and "stop being shy". I have no shell and I'm not shy. Yet again it is just that our worlds don't align, that I'm a square peg trying to fit your round hole because your round hole is what is considered to be correct.

It's 2am on a Saturday

The streets are filled with energy and anger. Mostly anger. In nooks and crannies men are trying to bring their women around from some situation or other, or people are shouting on the phone to people they've become separated from probably by design rather than accident.

I see striped shirts are out now and checked shirts are in. The streets are a sea of check over blue denim and men loiter in gangs whilst shouting. Spatial context is gone and they roam and wander with no regard for anyone else and you're constantly dodging some zigzagging 80s arm chair in a world of his own, oblivious to everyone else. Women strut down the street in defensive stances, their arms crossed and tucked squarely, only breaking form to occasionally pull their skirt down from 1 inch below their ass to the maximum extent of 2 inches. Packs of men hunt down the solo females and posture in a contest to devour them as the females strut on, eyes fixed forward and praying inside. Being the biggest, loudest fucking asshole you can be is obviously appealing to women.

Homeless men sit on benches and call out to you as you pass. I don't hear them as I'm listening to music through my earphones but I know they're calling out as they always do. Homeless females prefer to sit in doorways looking downtrodden, luring men into their lair. Men always want to save women when they're drunk…not because they want to free them but because they want to own them. Men kneel down in their check shirts to offer trite words of advice about giving up drink and drugs, which the homeless women toss away, and money which they keep, ready to be saved by the next man too.

Outside the popular pubs are schools of men in check shirts, and women of all sizes in short skirts. Fake tan and pink Stetsons cause a feeding frenzy that I have to carefully pick my way through as I know the slightest knock or nudge could alert the sharks to my presence. Voices are raised everywhere as men either pick out victims or look down at illuminated faces of phones, women flirt with doormen while they pull their skirts down, some sit on the pavement with kebabs in their laps and their knickers on show while the pavements around them are a collaboration of streams coming from doorways where men are pissing like animals.

I get to my destination; a small shop just beyond where the pubs thin out. "No alcohol" the angry man barks as I come in, the same as he does to everyone. I take a diet coke to the counter which he rings up in silence. I look at the price on the till display and pay, then he hands me my change in silence. I think "no alcohol" is the only English he knows and as I leave a gang of men dressed as marathon runners pour in to a chorus of "No alcohol".

Walking back the way I have come I once more walk through the chaos and anger, the fear and the desperation, and the further I walk the more the women thin out having all but been picked off. The city seems to work as one; a predatory eco-system with everyone hunter of some and victim of other. Men have returned home with their trophies, or their hangovers, and I have returned home with my diet coke.

I don't even need diet coke…I just have an urge to be among people that are, like it or not, my peers. I need to prey on them, I want to experience them even if it is at a distance. I hate them but it is the jealous hatred of a child who can't have what he so desperately wants.

A life half lived

When I was younger we had a board game called The Game of Life. Despite its facetious name I suppose it was fairly accurate. You went to school and got a degree, got a job, married, bought a house, had kids then retired. In a way that's what life is to most people. Now that I'm getting on in years I see that people around me are all in long-term relationships, or getting married, or having kids, or buying houses, or planning retirement…playing The Game.

When I was a kid we spent our days pulling pigtails and playing computer games. Now that I'm an adult it's kinda weird how everyone else is playing The Game but I'm still pulling pigtails and playing computer games. I don't dwell on it, but sometimes I think about all of the normal things I've never known, and probably never will know. Time is marching on relentlessly but I'm staying the same, getting more and more distant from my peers, never being able to advance beyond those first few squares. They're developing their lives while I'm treading water. Next they'll all be dying, just to make me jealous.

I suppose in a way my current abstinence from alcohol is simply a subconscious furtherance of this retraction from life. I was never the social butterfly, but when I was drinking I did at least have a reason to leave my house at the weekend when the sun was down. I wasn't socialising as such, but at least I was out among people. I wasn't diving from the high board, but at least I had my toes in the water. At least I was rolling the dice.

Every day when I go into work and hear about the lives of others it's dawning on me what "life" is supposed to be and the pleasure people get from it. If they knew the truth, my life to them would seem like the plot from some futuristic horror movie. They don't know the truth though, so instead each Monday they ask "What did you do at the weekend?"; faces aglow with fresh memories and enthusiasm.

"Nothing."

Killing time

Sunday, 6pm. I haven't left the house all day. I got up late and did French toast for lunch, started playing my xbox and here I still am. Not only a stranger to the outside, but also to clothes. I put the controller down, get dressed, gather up The Picture of Dorian Gray and head to my local by way of the newsagent. I haven't showered or washed since Friday night.

It is bitterly cold outside but the pub is warm, if loud, and fairly busy although there is a table free so I stay. I order a diet coke and sit at the free table and place my paper down. I lament at the growing redundancy of newspapers as the last sections are "sport" (in the UK sport is a euphemism for "football") that I have no interest in so never read. It seems to me that there are two kinds of men…one who reads a newspaper from the back to the front, and me. Leaving the professional lives of footballers to face the table, I turn over the first, second, third, fourth and fifth pages of the front of the paper as they are adorned with the personal lives of footballers that I have no interest in.

My paper spent, and me no more educated, I sit still for a while and listen to the music that, for once, is quite pleasant, if a little loud. It feels like that special effect you see on TV where the protagonist stays still while the world flurries past in a stop-motion blur. To my left are a group of musicians that are killing time waiting for their gig to start at the venue next door. To the right of me are a group of men, standing up in the glow of the television that broadcasts sport. Having lost the power of speech, everything the say must be shouted and enforced with fists on tables and unreasonably loud and raucous fake laughter. If they can address someone at the other end of the room rather than one beside them it is all the better as they can scream and shout all the louder.

At the bar is sat an off-duty barmaid. It seems that when you work at a bar it becomes your life. You're there when you're working and socialising when you're not. She is an attractive girl with a good body that she refuses to show off. Queen bee in human form, everywhere she goes there is a swarm of men buzzing around her and she flits her attention between them all, flirtatiously running her fingers through her honey-blonde hair.

The time I used to kill with alcohol is now left to me to spend in regret. I wonder if I actually don't want to be social, or if I've just given up. A part of me envies these people and their circle of friends, spending time instead of killing it. Filling their moments with joy and happiness while I fritter mine away. A part of me remembers the two unanswered text messages on my phone and remembers who I am.

Leaving the room to themselves, I open my book and continue to read while I try my best to block out the environment. When I'm done reading I'll go home to my xbox. I'll have something to eat. I'll watch a movie. I'll wait for the day to end.

Damn you, cruel fate!

There's a terrible twist to having Asperger's Syndrome that leads me to believe it was either designed by the devil, or I have been a very bad person in a former life. It goes without saying that I'm not the best face-to-face communicator which makes it all the harder for starting relationships. I can only really meet women in quite controlled circumstances… pubs and clubs are out of the question, as are overly noisy places or places where there are lots of distractions. Hopefully also a place the same woman habituates to allow me to gradually get to know her and work what little charms I have. Now let's throw into the mix the fact that all of my pastimes are either solitary or male-dominated, and it'd be easier finding a bacon sandwich in a mosque than a suitable partner.

My quiver is not entirely devoid of arrows though. Via a focused and controllable medium like e-mail where it is just me, the canvas, and time, I can be quite eloquent. When the social barrier that stops me taking part in the world is not a factor I can let my real self come out, I can express myself and engage with people. I imagine that the way I communicate through e-mail is the way normal people communicate face to face. These keys…these fingers…this is my face.

So at a certain level I am able to stir interest in a member of the opposite sex…but why do we e-mail people in the first place? Because we have no physical access to them, usually because they live far away. And that's the sand in the Vaseline. The one social skill I do have rendered completely useless.

Transmogrification

It's dawning on me that my concept of friendship isn't quite what I thought it was. I think I've been under the influence of friendship-by-proximity. I've changed jobs a few times and I know the drill…everyone says they want to keep in touch but you all drift apart anyway. Lots of people I know are still friends with people from old jobs so I know it's just me…or more accurately people with Asperger's Syndrome.

I've always liked the people I worked with in my previous job and liked spending time with them. Or so I thought. Now that I've changed jobs and don't have to spend time with them and will only have to go to things I'm invited to…I have a strange feeling coming over me. Almost like a weight off my shoulder. Not a big weight, not a boulder…more like a few handfuls of sand. I'm subconsciously coming to terms with the fact that I probably won't ever see any of them ever again and it's actually a strange relief of sorts.

So does part of my brain force me to believe I am friends with these people because I have to be? Because I work with them? Or do I do my best to be friends but I don't recognise the mental effort it takes, so now I don't have to be friends with them I can avoid having to make that effort? Sure I lose the friends, but my life is easier.

The other aspect to this is one of paranoia I guess. Not being able to read people's motives or genuine feelings very well I don't know if they also are only friends-by-proximity too. Do they only pretend to be friends with me because they have to? Because they work with me? I don't know to be honest, and I'm not sure I want to contact these people to say "hey you want to go for a drink tonight?" only to be met with ums and ahs and excuses.

I just feel like as the days drift on I'm getting more and more used to the fact that that part of my life is now over and I'll probably never return to it. And not only that, but for the rest of my life I might never really find a genuine, stay-with-me friend. For many reasons - not just because I find it hard to know what is involved in maintaining a friendship, but now I also realise I have a fear of committing myself to something that is not reciprocated. A fear that as I don't know who is a genuine friend I could end up feeling humiliated.

First day of school

I started my new job yesterday and today (Friday) was the end of my first week…so to speak. The day before I started I was just pacing up and down the house, not knowing what to do with myself. How to kill the time.

So the job is going ok so far, but they're obviously not expecting me to be running the whole company for them yet, I'm just on light duties at the moment but that's par for the course in this industry. Helping resolve minor problems in existing systems is the best way of learning your way around how things work and how they're put together. I'm quite sure I've surprised them with how quickly I've picked things up…but I'm like that; I just look at code and I understand it, it's how my brain works. I've already played a good part of getting something finished on time which isn't bad going seeing as this is a massive computer application that I spent the morning of my first day looking at and was fixing issues with from lunch-time onward. I just hope I can rise to the real challenge which is when they start to expect more of a leadership role from me.

The people I work with are nice, quite agreeable and easy to get along with. They're quite juvenile but that's fine with me as I'm hardly Mr Mature myself so I quite like the low level of the banter and humour in the office. I far prefer it to people who are more serious and grown-up.

Alas they're also really, really social. It's a big company and the whole company seems social but our little group in our little office are very social among each other too. Naturally they expect me to just slip into this fast-lane of uber mixing but it's all too soon for me. It's too soon with these people I've just met, and socialising the way they want to in noisy clubs is just too much for me period. But what can you do? You can go along and hope to cope, or politely decline and look like the office outsider. I liked going out with my old workmates but I had time to get to know them all. With my new colleagues it's like I've been pushed into a busy road.

As well as the weekend activities I have avoided, there is an unofficial "networking" event happening at a local pub next Wednesday that apparently lots of local companies in our industry go to. They were telling me about it with glee at lunch, how great it is and what a laugh it is…drinking and meeting lots of new people. Great for you maybe…hell for me. Again I can either not go and have it look like I'm not a team-player, not fitting in, not mixing, not caring about my career…or I can go and look like a deer caught in headlights and be all awkward and drop the ball whenever someone tries to talk to me. I mean…I can't "network", and I don't want to either. There is also the risk I'll want to stick with my own colleagues and end up looking like a lost puppy following them around. On top of all of that Wednesday is a gym night. I'll either have to just get out of it, or go but say I can't stay long.

Being suddenly dropped in this world of hyper-sociality has made me feel quite disorientated and inadequate. It reminds me how different everyone else is, how much social interaction really drives their whole lives. How much joy interacting with people brings them.

Normally with smaller firms this stuff isn't an issue, but with these big firms how you "fit in" is a big thing for them, as important as your actual work. This is where them knowing I have Asperger's Syndrome would probably help as it might give me some leeway and let them know I can't help drowning in their lifestyle. I mean I know I get better given time…I just need that time to slowly adjust and integrate, and to get to know people. I can't just instantly morph into a social animal.

Which leads me onto the next thing. My line manager's wife is a teacher at an autistic school. Great. When he brought it up someone in the office said that the kids would be great to take to a casino (in reference to "Rain Man") and he corrected them on the difference between autism and being a savant. So he obviously knows a little about it all and there may be trouble ahead there. Though on the other side, if it comes down to it and my lack of "fitting in" is causing me problems I guess I'll have an ally there if I do decide to tell them. Though I can't see it getting that far. I've long suspected through my whole career that my technical abilities have helped negate the downsides of my personality and helped carry me when normally I'd have been dropped.

Interesting times ahead so batten down the hatches.

Five, six, pick up chicks

I've been watching a series on yoof television called "The Pickup Artist" which is a show where experts from the "seduction community" (can you believe they've actually given what they do a name?) tutor life's losers in the art of picking up women. Tools of their trade include a raft of TLAs, hyperbolic terminology, pseudo-philosophy and armchair psychology.

The gist is that you lie and pretend you're someone you're not in order to get girls interested in you. Now I'm not sure if the seduction community have gotten as far as solving the mysteries of what happens when she finds out you're just a lying user, but it's fascinating television nonetheless.

Fascinating as there are elements of truth in it. Truth in as much as some of it is common sense, and some does seem to work some of the time. But also some truths I've always wondered about myself. One element of how attracted a woman is to you, and receptive to being "picked up", is a concept they call your "social value". This is a term for your value to others as a social entity. For example if a certain quality of people are seen to be your friends, and you're seen to be at the centre of the group you obviously have a high social value, so if you are of value to others there is a chance you will also be of value to the girl. This perception of social value is something that assures a woman that you are worthy of her time and company, and that your social value may even rub off onto her.

Tricks used to give you a sense of social value were to make sure you were always with a group of male friends, preferably with a "wing man" whose job it is to make you look better and give the impression that you have an elevated position in the group. Other tricks were when approaching a group of girls you say something like "I can only stay for a few minutes as I have to get back to my friends." Again this demonstrates that you are a valuable member of your group so are desirable social companion. The concept of high social value also encompasses dressing well and being well groomed.

Reflecting on my own life where I never keep up with what is trendy and go everywhere and do everything alone my social value is probably transparent. Maybe this is a reason people with Asperger's can be in a room full of people yet feel like they just don't exist. A reason why my plate is empty.

Moving on

I had my first job interview today, and got offered the job. The company was my second choice as my first one hadn't got back to me yet. Tonight I discovered that my first option had e-mailed me two days ago but it was in my spam folder. To be honest after speaking with the company that interviewed me today I was more interested in the job than I was before so I'm hoping that maybe God is trying to tell me something. At least I can always try the other firm if this one doesn't work out.

The interview itself was gruelling though, I felt like I'd done ten rounds with Mike Tyson by the time it was over. Before I even went for the interview I had to do an on-line test (I got in the 80th percentile). Before the interview started I had to do a written test. When the interviewers turned up I had even more questions to answer, code samples to diagnose and analyse and it was relentless. An hour and a half in total.

The people interviewing me were the lead developer and the HR manager. Now I'm not sure if this was part of the "test", but the HR manager (female) had quite a low-cut top so I had to be on my best behaviour with eyes at 12 O'Clock at all times. We were both sat at a massive desk with me at one side and her at the other. The jug of water was in the middle, some four feet from where either of us were sat. "Do you mind?" she said, gesturing toward the water. With that she leant right over toward me to reach for the jug of water while jugs of flesh fell and, for what seemed an eon, she poured a glass as I looked at the clock on the wall, the watch on my wrist, my shoes, the door, out of the window, at the pen on the desk…all the time screaming in my head "DON'T LOOK AT HER BREASTS!!!".

I think I got away with it.

It's at times like this people with Asperger's can feel their loneliest. I'm about to embark on a daunting new chapter in my life…but who do I tell? Who is there to congratulate me? To have a drink with me? No-one. I had a quiet drink by myself in my local while drunken old men played pool. Then I had another pint in another pub while pretty young things chatted around me. Then I got some takeaway food. Then I came home.

Go me.

This is my love for you

It pretty much goes without saying that I've never really been that great with the opposite sex. Instigating significant relationships is probably one of the biggest challenges to people with Asperger's Syndrome (AS), fraught as they are with everything we're not. It requires much non-verbal communication, flirting, conversation skills, showing an interest in other people, eye-contact, subtle body contact and so on and so forth.

Before my diagnosis I'd always done my best, you know? I mean, God loves a trier. It usually takes me a while to get comfortable enough around someone to talk at least semi-freely instead of being all tight and nervous and self-conscious. It's bad enough with everyday people, but faced with a girl I find attractive or like and it seems to render me fairly useless. I just clam up. It's not so bad if it is with someone you are around a lot as you get a chance to get comfortable and relax, but I'm not around women a lot. When most of the people you meet are in small bites I just lack the skills to make those instant, lasting impressions. I lack that "confidence" that women seem to value above all else.

Since my diagnosis I kind of know how Adam felt in the Garden of Eden. Although I've always had AS, plucking my diagnosis has opened my eyes, made me aware, and made me ashamed. Although I've had girlfriends in the past…now I can't see how I'll ever have one again, which is odd because I'm still the same person after all. Now that I know what is wrong with me the fear of failing is stopping me trying. I seem to resign myself to "this isn't going to work so why bother" right from the outset. In fact when I think about it, it's almost as if I've been subconsciously pushing women away my whole life. Women don't really dig the facial hair, and I'm certainly no Schwarzenegger but my body type is already beyond what most women would "go for."

And that's just the initial flirty stuff, how would I ever cope actually going out with someone again knowing what I know now? Could I put myself through "Why do we never just talk" again? Could I put myself through "Let's go down the pub" again? Could I put myself through "Come meet all my friends" again? Could I put myself through "Why are you so rude" again? Could I put myself through "You never listen to me" again? Could I put up with making all of the sacrifices again? Could I put up with having to keep my flat clean again? Don't get me wrong, there are plus sides to relationships too; it's great always having someone to text or email just to say about something funny you thought of, or something interesting you've heard. It's great having someone to cuddle and sometimes go places with. But I can't help seeing a relationship as the greater of all evils.

I guess the truth doesn't always set you free.

Piecemeal we die

Things are not going so good right now. Nothing major; no-one has died, helicopters do not need deployed and my DVD player is working fine. In fact I can't really put my finger on one single thing, it's just the culmination of lots of little things. I think this is what doctors refer to as depression.

The venue I go to at the weekend has now closed down so it's a major blow to a lot of things in my life. My routine, the fact that if I ever left the house at the weekend then 70% of the time that was where I went, I could fit in there, there were interesting people to watch, I liked the music...they had a pool table. What am I going to do at the weekend now? The only other pubs are those ghastly ones that play dance music and are populated by "lads" in this stupid uniform they all have at the weekend where everyone wants to wear the same clothes. I'm going to have to find a new pub now, form a new routine.

There is a nice music festival that happens around this time of year that I always go to. It's local so I can walk, have a drink and just chill. I checked the internet to see when it was on this year...this weekend! So I missed today's event totally but I'll go to tomorrow's. I just hope the weather is fine. I am supposed to be going to someone else's BBQ but I'm going to cancel that. I'll have to lie about the reason I can't go because;

a) they will want to come with me to the festival
b) I'm a horrible person

I'm actually writing this at work right now. Something else I'm hating in my life. I work too much, I care too much...I spend time running after people who don't care, do sloppy work and have no attention to detail. I shouldn't care as much as I do but I can't help it. I should be like everyone else...do a bad job, enjoy myself at the weekend then come in on Monday to find out some schmuck gave up his weekend to fix my work. I should be out and about at the weekend relaxing and doing what I want, or doing nothing. Not at work the whole time, I never seem to get to rest.

I have stuff I need to do for other people but haven't yet done. I always tell myself I'll do it at the weekend, then I spend my weekend in work and don't feel like it. I start to go for long periods with my phone off, I stop checking my e-mail. One of these days I'm going to buy a sandwich board that says "LEAVE ME ALONE".

I can feel myself slipping away. Giving up. Resigning.

I like watchin' the puddles gather rain

I stepped outside my comfort zone this weekend and visited someone I knew a fair bit from the internet. They'd moved into a new house so I went for a visit. I travel light, but I took my laptop with me also as I pretty much take it everywhere. It's the only thing I have of any real value so I don't like leaving it at my flat when I stay somewhere else. It doesn't have any monetary value, but it has all of my email, documents, and a lifetime of dead projects for which one day I may unlock a spell to resurrect. This laptop is my whole world.

The friend that I went to see was quite typical in that their life seems to revolve around other people. I found it quite exhausting just listening to it all, and in a way it made me feel quite odd too. It's hard to explain really, but it was a mix of inadequacy and confusion. When people are so fascinated by things that you have no facility for processing it's hard to imagine how normal people think. It's not like someone liking sport but you don't, or someone liking pop music and you don't, but when people's lives revolve around bonds and interactions with others that you have no means of creating, and they have such glee in knowing information you yourself have no way of amassing it's a glimpse of a world you'll never know. But that's how it is for people not like me. It brings home that my solitary world goes beyond just doing everything on my own, it brings home that I'm not just like normal people only a little different…it shows me that I'm nothing like normal people. At all. Everything that is life to them means nothing to me at all.

Something else I learned was that other people's lives seem so…complicated. It's like the more people you involve in your life, the more complicated your life is. As if their problems and issues osmose into your life, and your issues and problems into theirs. The more people you surround yourself with the larger the collective pool of conflict you bathe in. I couldn't do that. On reflection my own life is incredibly uneventful, my problems minor and my drama almost non-existent. Not only that but my problems are seemingly my own…they are neither shared nor halved. I have no particular desire to involve people in the issues I do have. The whole experience was quite eye-opening, but it isn't a world I could live in, the idea frankly terrifies me.

So in the morning I picked up my laptop, my light travel bag…tossed my only baggage over my shoulder and came home to my DVD, my XBOX. My so-called life.