The Pros and Cons of Being

 We met some great people on this last adventure, and I'm glad we met them; I hope we remain friends; but I felt so incredibly out of place, and walked away feeling ashamed of myself for how I see the world.  Clearly, what I have to say and how I feel doesn't matter, in that it isn't changing anything.  I've been repeating myself long enough to finally be convinced that there is something wrong with me.  Call it what you want; dig up some elusive psychological dysfunction; I must simply be a little bit retarded, and I have to come to terms with that at some point.

 I recently started a new project with one brave soul, and was completely excited about it until I really watched the footage.  What was supposed to be a project about a "normal" person's experience with the vulnerability of being naked, turned into me going on a on about me, and what I'm doing.  I've been doing this for twenty-five years, and I'm still defending myself; I'm still trying to convince people that I'm not doing what they assume I'm doing... which was what I did for over a decade of said time by complete accident... and I have come to terms with the fact that no one will ever understand that I ignorantly didn't know any better.
I'm forty-one years old, doing what I love (time and finances permitting), and investing most of my time and energy into making excuses for something that I have been obsessed with since I was a child; I've spent most my life making excuses for existing... and like five people get it..... so what the fuck am I doing?  I really never felt like I was good enough.  I always put unrealistic expectation on myself that I could never live up to; not this guy in this world.  More importantly, I have always demanded that people understand things that I clearly don't.  How do I expect anyone to just be, with someone who spends so much time apologizing for being?  At some point I imagine I will have to stop apologizing for being me, but this has been a depressing couple weeks for this stupid guy in this stupid world.  Everyone is free to not understand what I'm talking about, including me, and I am also free to keep going.  I still don't want to conform to your spoon fed ideal, but I'm tired of feeling doomed to fail, while worrying about paying bills.  I've been approaching a cross-road for the better part of this year, staring blankly in the mirror, obsessively checking on likes and followers like a child searching for approval from his parents.