Thank you once again for your thoughtful replies! I appreciate your feedback so much and it helps to know that I'm not an ungrateful jerk.

Skeezyks, I'm not much of a sales person but I'll definitely have to "sell it" in terms of projecting a happy go lucky attitude. I'm good at deflecting and changing the subject, so that's something at least. I've noticed that people like to talk about themselves. I've already used up the "Oh did you call?" and the "I'm not sure what's going on with my cell service" excuses in the past year lol. I think I met the quota on the number of times those excuses can be considered acceptable. I also use the "I have a migraine" and "I'm sick" excuses quite often. I do suffer from migraines and I tend to get sick often, but I think they know something is up. I'll do my best to utilize the "getting involved in other things and forgetting" scenario you've described, because that's closer to the truth. Thank you for your suggestions!

dandylin: I have a tendency to psych myself up for these things as well. I used to rely on alcohol to do it, but I usually wind up making a fool of myself. Kind of the opposite of laying low, lol. I'll need to come up with "talking points" or something. I feel like an idiot for having to do that, but you have to do what you have to do, right?

Shriveled Muse, I know exactly what you mean. Sometimes you really do have to fake it till you make it. Sometimes it works, but sometimes it doesn't. I've been bottling my emotions for years so it's unfortunately second nature to me. I've been doing it for so long that I've become numb, which is probably worse. I don't know how to connect anymore. Like you, I simply want to fit in and not attract any attention to myself by bursting into tears or something equally humiliating.

The questions that I hate are: "so what's new with you?" or "are you dating anyone?" and my favorite, "when are you gonna get married, you're already an old maid!" Yup. There's absolutely nothing "new" with me, or at least nothing worth talking about, and I haven't dated anyone in years. I'm a boring person, as my stepmother loves to tell me. I know I'm not the only woman be asked the marriage question in particular, but seriously to my family being 30 and unmarried is apparently a fate worse than death. I have an aunt that's starting to send me annoying texts about "this great guy" she wants me to meet. How can I date anyone if I can't even hold a conversation without being fake? When I tell her that I'm not interested, she tells everyone else (and I mean everyone) to try to guilt trip me. Not gonna budge on that one though. If I want to die alone (my stepmom's words) that's my business. So what if I do? lol sorry for going on a rant there!

The interesting thing is that when I'm not depressed and anxious, I'm a pretty easy going person and I enjoy making people laugh. So I guess I'll just go for making them laugh and hope to god that they don't ask me any personal questions that I haven't prepared myself for. You would think I was going into battle or something...