Disappiontment haunted all my dreams...

I love deeply and passionately, whether it’s as a friend or a lover. I, foolishly, I expect that same kind of devotion back. The I’d-take-a-bullet-for-you kind of devotion.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t exist. Most people won’t take a bullet for you, or even rock the boat when required. I get passionate about friends when something happens to them and I immediately want to run out and make it right. I want to help them, save them, abolish all their pain. So I expect that much back.

The problem with high expectations is that no one can live up to them. I can’t. But that doesn’t stop me from expecting everyone else to.

I think that is one of the biggest problems in my relationships. I tend to connect over-passionately to friends, lovers, companions. I want to know everything, be involved in everything, share everything. I want to stand by you and fight the good fight – or the dirty fight as necessary. And I expect you to take up arms with me when the world has turned dark and cold and the battle has begun.

But the taking up of arms has long since lost its glamour and friends and lovers don’t want to be out in the dark and cold. They’re happy to send you out and say, yay, you’re going out into the dark and cold. Good for you. You’ll learn so much about yourself. Yeah, mainly that you’re stupid enough to go out into the dark and cold alone.

So I find myself, more often than not, screaming in frustration at the lack of support around me. I find myself crushed with disappointment when my level of expectation is not even approached. I find myself hurt as friend after friend and lover after lover (well, maybe not that many of them as there have been so few) find an excuse to say goodbye. Or, better yet, find a way to break my spirit and shatter my soul before they leave then step on the carcass on their way out.

Wow, that’s awful, people say. You should just ignore that and just go on. That’s what you should do. Oh, we’re not going to do anything about the fact that you’ve been shattered other than offer you words of comfort and some distant compassion.

I want you to be outraged with me. I want you to be angry with me. I want you to storm the castle gates and cry “battle” and slay the stupid son-of-a-bitch (or bitch, depending) that bruised my soul and wounded my pride. I want you to share in the feast afterwards (particularly fond of French toast a 3 AM type of feast) and trade battle stories and reflect on the good we have done. I want you to feel my pain, my sorrow, my anger, my grief and not tell me it’s going to be a helpful thing for me in the future.

But, as I have learned and continue to learn, that won’t happen. So I guess I’ll have to learn to lower my expectations and live with a life less than. Or keep the expectations high and just cut those who don’t meet them. That will leave a very narrow field, if any left at all. But which is worse? Cutting the loss or keeping the pain? Hard to know the difference sometimes.