Isolation and self-pity

I don't know if its the fact that its summer, or that its because I'm a stay at home parent, or if its because we home school, or if its just because I'm a sucky person, but I am really feeling the isolation of my life right now.  The kids sense it too, although we really try to take advantage of summer opportunities which allow them more outings than fall through spring.  Its these opportunities that draw my attention to the realization that I do not belong and I do not fit in--anywhere.

I occasionally take advantage of the free lunch program that is found in the parks and school yards around the nation.  So we find our shoes and walk across the street to the elementary school where the kids are fed brown tuna on gluey white bread and they are ecstatic because they are eating around other kids.  Oh and they get chocolate milk.  I have a love/hate relationship with this program.  The food is generally atrocious, but its there and its a social opportunity.  Children are forbidden to take food and will be chased down by summer lunch ladies if they mosey away with an apple half-eaten in their hand.  The distributors of the food can't take the untouched items back, according to the federal regulations.  So where my kids can only eat one apple between the three of them and would be satisfied with 1/3 of the food offered, but because they all want their own milk and entree, the rest of the food has to be thrown away.  Even untouched it can't go home for later.

Enough about the food though--that's a problem to itself.  Its the crowds of parents sitting together, the kids who all know one another and the ones who know my kids through various activities.  Its parents that we've carpooled with.  Its people who might be friendly enough to say hi, but scurry back to their own groups.  I am grossly reminded that I am different.  I am not welcome.  Their children, who are great friends of mine in other settings, behave as though my kids harbor the plague.  Its hurtful.  I hate being the outcast, outsider.

Let's not assume that its only this one facet of social interaction, where the isolation is present.  We've attended a church for well over 2 years now, becoming members a year ago.  Its a big church and we appreciate the messages delivered every Sunday by pastors who appear to love God and His people.  We appreciate the children's opportunities and try to take part in them as much as possible.  But we don't really belong.  I notice it when a conversation stops as we walk by (I know they aren't talking about me, I'm not known or note-worthy myself).  Its in the unacknowledged "hi, how's it going?"  Its the invisibility at child pickups and drop offs.  Part of me wants to strike up a desperately uncomfortable conversation with a parent, any parent, just to make them feel as uncomfortable as I do, and another part of me wants to keep that pathetic, half-smile pasted on my face long enough to sign my initials and get the hell out of there.  I usually go with the second option.

Here is the truth though.  We wouldn't fit in anyway if we followed a conventional lifestyle.  If we both worked, and the kids went to school and preschool, if we lived the American dream, if we looked the part of either happy consumer or happy hippy, we might fit in.  But our normal isn't normal enough.  Its just enough to keep us in a very, very narrow niche where we don't have enough in common with anyone else.