Left out and confused

I don't know if I'm on the right forum, but I thought I'd give it a try as I'm desparate for some help. When I was newly divorced 3 years ago, I was offered a job to work in a small office ... myself and 5 other women. I was anxious to start and make some new friends at my new job.
On my first day, as I was introduced to my co-workers, I greeted them happily. Strangely, very few of them made any effort to carry on a simple conversation with me. I tried to ask them the kind of "open ended" questions so that they would have the opportunity to talk about themselves.
I was provided with short, curt answers. I found it interesting that no one asked me anything about me.
I shook it off as I realize that I am shy and that they would come around when they were ready.
A few weeks passed and finally, one of the girls invited me to a party at her home. She was hosting it for all the girls in the office. I offered to bring a special dish. The host told me that she would give me directions later that week.
Well, the day came where she was handing out directions to her home to all of the office girls ... all except for me. She walked right by me and never offered the directions.
I reminded her, with a smile on my face, that I had my special dish ready and she totally ignored me.
I guess I could say that my heart was a little hurt. I went home and ate my potatoe salad alone and wondered why she "uninvited " me .
I always keep a positive attitude and never have said or done anything to hurt any of those women.
Several times after that, the girls would make plans for "get togethers" at work, but would eliminate me entirely.
Through all this, I fought back tears and never let them see me sweat.
Our office is part of a large distribution company that employs mostly men and since all of us were single, I guess it only made matters worse when a male co-worker asked me to go out with him. He made me happy and we went out for 2 years.
I know wonder if the women were somehow competing for the attention of the male workers. None of them were ever asked out.
Things are no better now ... whenever I say anything at all, I can see them out of the corner of my eye, rolling their eyes and looking at each other.
I still haven't given up trying to make friends as I try not to hold grudges. When I do manage to strike up a conversation, I try to listen carefully and follow up with the person on their issues.
I only wish I knew what I did wrong.
If anyone else out there has experienced this kind of rejection from people, I'd like to hear your story.
I'm also open to any suggestions to where I went wrong here.

I appreciate your patience and understanding.

S. Connecticut

Don't think of it so much as where you went wrong. Even if you did something wrong that would be very hard for us to discern from your point of view here on these forums.

All I can really suggest to you is that you ran into a group of self-centered women who haven't left the realm of high school/college and still fill their lives with drama and backstabbing. Try looking for friends else where.

I assume you aren't very religious otherwise I'm certain you would have friends there, correct?

If you are still dating, ask your partner to introduce you to people or take you some where with people. Or if you know of any social gatherings, going there and mingling of course is a standard option for building relationships with new people.

It also might be wise, depending on yourself and the women on your faculty, to ask them for a reflection on yourself. They may be being childish, or maybe you have some personality attribute they find negative and you don't realize you have. Open-mindedly understanding that possibility might help you to control it. Sort of like biting your nails.

Good Luck either way.

I dont think they grew up, Im at College and we dont even do that. You can find friends online, via forums, chat rooms. I found some really close friends from teenspot, yes i admit, teenspot. And if you contribute to our discussions you'll be welcomed into this online community.