So, time is an incredibly fickle asshole, and if I could, I'd kick him in the balls. End of story. But I can't, so I'm left whining about 'him'.

It feels as though I've wasted a giant portion of my life on getting to know people who only, in the end, bring me irritation, anger, grief, betrayal or enhance my cynicism... or some combination.

In the past six months, my boyfriend, who I bent over backwards to help, robbed me and disappeared. A very close friend of mine died, leaving her husband and her two small children (and me) to cope with her absence. My best friend in the world turned out to be a pathological liar and almost ruined a mutual friend's career. And this is only recently. The pattern seems to repeat itself over and over in my life.

So, here's my question: Do I keep trying to get close to people? Even if I know that in all likelihood, they will hurt me more than they will enhance my life? And really, do I have a choice? Because as much as I try to put up walls to keep myself safe, they don't work. They crumble. I need an engineer to build them, because engineer I am not. I can't seem to control my level of involvement with people, friends and otherwise. I can't prevent myself from caring about people. I can't stamp down my inevitable desire to help people. But I want to.

If compassion had a switch, I would turn mine off. But would that be in my best interest? Maybe, although seeing it now isn't likely, maybe there has been some underlying bit of information that I could take away from these situations and use to improve myself, but right now I don't see it. I want to believe that there is meaning or wisdom to be gathered from events such as these, but I can't.

And I am so tired of asking myself these kinds of questions. I am so tired of living with the fear that people are going to hurt me. I am so tired of trusting when I shouldn't and rejecting when I should trust. I am so tired of waiting to live the kind of life I want to live. I am so tired of dragging myself out of the muck of reality, only to fall back in. I want to live. I want to believe. I want to thrive. But I am so fucking tired.