Yeah, same here. I'm sitting at a Barnes & Noble cafe right now, actually. I prefer to be here over being at home, because if I'm alone in my apartment too much in one go, the "lonely" thing really kicks in big-time. But, by the same token, even though I like having people around right now, I very, very much do not want to talk to any of these people, or interact with them in pretty much anyway. Well, OK, other than the two hot baristas serving coffee, especially the redhead, but I digress...
Anyway, the "lonely but want to be left alone" thing really resonates with me. I definitely am a lonely person, as I find it harder and harder to "connect" with people on a deep level as I get older, and I don't have many truly close friends even though most people think of me as highly social, and I have tons and tons of acquaintances. So I know lots of people, am social enough to interact with strangers when I want to, have no problems networking and talking to people at events, etc... but I still mostly don't enjoy being around people, except for a very selective set of people that I deem interesting. Most people bore me very quickly, which is, I suppose, part of my problem. Very few people just seem to be interested in anything genuinely interesting. Outside of hanging out at SplatSpace (local hackerspace), most people strike me as fairly boring.
It also doesn't help that I have strongly held opinions and positions that make me a minority in one sense of another in most social groups (I'm a Libertarian and I'm atheist) so the set of people I'm likely to feel good about deeply engaging in is already pretty small.
Anyway, the "lonely but want to be left alone" thing really resonates with me. I definitely am a lonely person, as I find it harder and harder to "connect" with people on a deep level as I get older, and I don't have many truly close friends even though most people think of me as highly social, and I have tons and tons of acquaintances. So I know lots of people, am social enough to interact with strangers when I want to, have no problems networking and talking to people at events, etc... but I still mostly don't enjoy being around people, except for a very selective set of people that I deem interesting. Most people bore me very quickly, which is, I suppose, part of my problem. Very few people just seem to be interested in anything genuinely interesting. Outside of hanging out at SplatSpace (local hackerspace), most people strike me as fairly boring.
It also doesn't help that I have strongly held opinions and positions that make me a minority in one sense of another in most social groups (I'm a Libertarian and I'm atheist) so the set of people I'm likely to feel good about deeply engaging in is already pretty small.
sigh