Someone please explain to me why we all put so much stock into relationships? In the past year alone I've watched as friends have turned their backs on one another, some of the most decent people in the world cheated on by the one person they were supposed to be able to trust. Seen people lie about terminal illness for attention, I've seen people smothered by a controlling and overbearing spouse. I've been bystander to a relationship that can't last for more than a month at a time, and marriage is considered as though it could actually work. I've seen people that I care about turn suddenly and claim I am completely to blame, while saying 'it takes two' in the same breath. Even my closest friends ignore me and then say I've abandoned them. Come to think of it I haven't seen much to give me faith in this relationship thing. I feel quite disassociated, even jaded by it all.
I find myself almost going out of my way to avoid any real interaction at all. Before I leave my apartment I plug into my Ipod in a very successful effort at keeping myself distant from the people I might have some contact with. Unplugging only to find out how much I owe for my groceries. I tend to feel that there is a pattern associated with relationships. Let's say it begins with friendship. Friendship leads to love, be it platonic or romantic. Love leads to attachment. Attachment leads to expectations, regardless of how hard you try to avoid them, expectations always seem to find their way in. Expectations lead to disappointment. Disappointment leads to pain, and resentment. Resentment may or may not lead to hate but it generally all ends with apathy.
We all have our own methods of dealing with this, because we've all experienced it before. Some of us just bounce from person to person trying to keep from getting in too deep. Some sabotage themselves at the first sign of trouble, some will lie for whatever attention they can get, and some will take whatever is in front of them just because it's there. Some of us jealously guard what we have to the point of suffocation, and others of us jade, and seclude ourselves to avoid the whole damn process altogether. Yet as miserable as the whole thing is, we seem to crave it. As proof there are thousands of different love songs dedicated to every stage of the process.
I submit that every one of us is an addict. Even with my perpetually jaded, and guarded perspective I find myself craving real companionship, and anyone that tells you they don't is lying. Love is a chemical reaction. It's powerful, mind-altering even. We all crave it, and we all do this same dance, and go to ridiculous lengths to get it. The whole thing is irrational and frustrating. I suppose my conclusion is that love, or any interaction on an emotional level, is an addiction, and we are all stupid for it. Now if you'll excuse me I have some indifference and disinterest to attend to. I think the hipster scene may be working out for me.
