I'm Tired

I'm tired. The world's been a cruel place to me. It's also been wonderful and amazing, but dishearteningly cruel at the same time. In much the way Tantalus suffered by having food to quench his hunger eternally in sight, but out of grasp. What have I done to deserve this punishment?

I look around me and see people happily content in their relationships, or sometimes not quite so, but still in them. I try to find my own slice of that happiness, and yet it seems I'm forever locked at the gates of a relationship, never allowed to step in.

The one time I was able to make my way in, I was brutally and savagely punished for it, as if having a relationship is something that is eternally forbidden to me and any attempt to have one is deserving of the same torment that those in Tartarus suffer for their crimes.

Yet in trying to understand my ostracization I find nothing but lies, misdirection, and manipulation. No one can tell me what the problem with me is that makes me somehow unworthy of the land of relationship; when I ask I get nothing but half-truths, dissemblements, and dismissals.

I feel like an outcast, good for little but exploitation from others and to be their emotional whipping post. I feel like my value is less than that of a slug, and I am cast aside by so many at that same level of value.

*sigh* What am I to do about it? I've tried so many different things, everything but being as deceptive, back-stabbing, manipulative and dishonest as everyone else. They say that in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. What was left out was that the one-eyed man is king only of himself, as everyone else would have cast him out for being able to see.

I'm so tired of fighting this alone, it's as if the whole world is against me. One of my favorite parts of Shakespeare's Hamlet is what I consider the most mis-understood part of all time.:

To be, or not to be, that is the question—
Whether 'tis Nobler in the mind to suffer
The Slings and Arrows of outrageous Fortune,
Or to take Arms against a Sea of troubles,
And by opposing, end them? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_be,_or_not_to_be)

Most see this as about death and/or suicide. I see it as a morality question: should one suffer the immorality (slings and arrows) of a comfortable life (outrageous fortune), or should one hold true to ones morals (take up arms) and challenge the overwhelming tide of abuse, loneliness and sorrow (sea of troubles) that comes from being resolved in one's morality? I've always chosen the latter as I refuse to let the impositions of what I see as an immoral society control my actions, much less my thoughts and feelings.

I believe this is the root of my suffering in relationships. Because the cultural view on what a relationship is 'supposed' to be, and how I do not conform to it, I fail spectacularly.

One thing I can say for sure is that it has served as an excellent filtering mechanism for people who are too caught up in social norms to actually see what's in front of them.

I just hope there really is an extraordinary woman out there who can see what's in front of her, rather than just the filter that society tells her to see with.

- Jason