A minor realization:  For various reasons, I have spent most of my life in one of two states with regard to the people around me.  Either I was in the background and unnoticed, or I was the center of attention.  I am fully comfortable with both positions, despite my occasional protestations to the contrary.  But it is very difficult for me to come to terms with being somewhere in between those two poles.  I feel awkward being just another face in the crowd, neither ignored nor adored.