I am neither snarky nor cool

Sometimes I wonder if I have a little big of agoraphobia or some other people phobia. Online, with my anonymity fairly well taken care of I don't feel panicky. But when I think about meeting people, especially those I converse with online, my heart palpitates and I feel anxious. I was looking at pictures from a meet up from one of the Mommy social networking sites that I sometimes go to and I was thinking that everyone looked so happy.

But then? I imagined myself in that situation. I imagined all of these women that I chat with online actually meeting me. And I started to feel overwhelmed by that. I know that I am not funny and have never claimed to be snarky (although I adore that word and want to say it over and over). I can sometimes write a silly story on here but I am not good at telling stories in real life. And I read blogs, lots of them. And some of those women are hilarious. The way these women describe mundane daily happenings makes me feel inadequate to the extreme.

Why should I worry about this? The likelihood that I will ever attend a BlogHer conference and meet my writing heroes is slim to nil. I think I would pee my pants if I was in the same room as someone like Dooce, or this person.

My aerobics (?) instructor thinks I should be her co-teacher and teach when she can't be there. In the middle of class on Monday this seemed like it might possibly be doable. There are only usually 4 people in there, and I am one of them. I would just need to memorize a routine and then be able to talk in the front of the class and move at the same time. But once I left, and was driving away, the thought of teaching the class made me want to hide in a dark little hidey hole and never come out. I was driving the next day, and a song came on the radio, a song with a good working out kind of beat. The instructor said that a good way to get started would be to make a disc of songs that have a good beat. Well, this song is playing on the radio and I am grooving, because in my car I dance a lot, and suddenly I was struck by a feeling of impending doom. Seriously, like if I was the one in charge of the class the world would end.

In my life, whenever I have been given responsibility I run. I have done it at two separate jobs. Both times I had a decent reason for leaving, once it was moving state. I loved my job, but was made assistant manager and actually did that for a few weeks before it overwhelmed me. The second time I left a job, they were only talking about making me assistant manager. And I also had a miscarriage, so I quit to move home with my mommy. It was only as I was writing this that I realized that it really is a problem for me.

I can't stand to be in charge. I know it bothers Will. He can't understand how I could feel that way. For him its easy. He exudes confidence and always has, I exude self loathing and fear. He is a born leader, people look up to him being an officer in the Army just fits him. I feel like a failure and want to hide. I don't want people looking up to me. It is scary enough to know that I already have two children who will undoubtedly look up to me and I need to at least be a person they can look up to.

(Why the picture of a Golden Columbine, you may ask? Well this post was so damned depressing to me, that it needed something pretty and light. And I love that picture.)