You ignore me at your peril, Matt. :-)

As for you, Amergin, there is no such word as "anyways". The correct term is "anyway". And if you see something that's far away from you it's NOT "a long ways off", it's "a long way off". Hah! I can be snide and snotty with the best of them...So there, you insidious knave!

Now back to Matt - Actually, Homeless makes some good points. I had an utterly miserable time with the opposite sex all through my teens and twenties...for a variety of reasons, but mostly just lack of confidence and lack of experience...due to previous lack of confidence and experience...you get the idea...

Females are great at spotting lack of confidence, and they tend to go the other way when they do.

Solutions? Well, the solution is obvious, but that doesn't mean it's easy. You just gotta bite the bullet and try, try, try, and then try again. Chances are you will be rejected many times (I certainly was), called gay by various idiots who have nothing better to do than denigrate someone they think is vulnerable in some way, and that generally you will have disappointments.

We all did. Most of us still do from time to time, and maybe more often than not.

Nothing really valuable is generally all that easy to achieve. On the other hand, being a loudmouth jerk who calls somebody else gay because he doesn't have a girlfriend, is very easy to do. That's why the biggest (and most insecure) jerks in school do it routinely. They're probably deathly afraid someone might think THEY are gay. The sad truth is that most men who are gay are way smarter and more interesting than those aforesaid jerks, and can talk and think circles around them. Ironical, isn't it? Not that it's of any help to you, but I do think it's highly ironical...

You just gotta roll with the punches, Matt.

And if you feel that nobody understands you...well, geez, I still feel like that on certain days...but what the hell, why should they understand me? I'm weird. Harmless, but weird. I accept that they don't understand me. Hell, most of them don't even understand themselves!

Oh...the best way to meet a great girl and form a great relationship is to have common interests with her. You like music? Go where people are playing it. You like a sport? Go play it. You like books? Go there. Whatever. It helps to have common ground to work from, and gets you a lot farther than fixating on a certain type of "look" and falling in love at "first sight" with some girl in the cafeteria about whom you know nothing.

Hey, but what do I know? I struck out so many times that I oughta be in the baseball hall of fame by now...in the greatest losers of all time section, that is. Ah! The sorrows of a squandered youth!!! Too soon old, and too late smart, that's what they say.

- LH