March 3rd 2k4

The words he spoke just to spite me, just to make me cringe, to hurt me, the words I always believed were lies, the words he used so many times to try to manipulate me—they’re coming true.

“You don’t have any friends.”

Them—all of them—they’re making it so. I don’t understand what their motives are, or their intentions. All I know is that I am lonely and none of them will help me not be.

I cannot escape the feeling that I desire to be loved. I want it more than anything else. I want to belong. I want to be wanted. This is no different from anyone else, except that I am not getting it. I have no one to turn to in my pain. No one will volunteer to end my suffering. Perhaps I am short-sighted, but I cannot recall any moment when a friend of mine in need ever went without my help.

All my life people have been praising me, and now I wonder if that was because they felt the need to say nice things to the child they pitied. Pity is not the same as love. And the disappointment that comes from realizing that your self-esteem has been nothing more than inflated words of sympathy is not the same as betrayal, not exactly.

Now I so often—too often—hear people ask me to leave, or tell me they don’t have time for me. Some don’t even bother to tell me; their actions speak for them.

I keep saying to them and to myself that I am not strong enough to handle this right now. But I am forced to wonder if that is accurate. Of course the anger in me may be what is keeping me company in the absence of the people I miss. But what kind of companion is anger?

I am tired of crying alone. And I am tired of having to cry before anyone hears my words.

I have tried with all of my being to be a good friend. I know of no better way, and in truth I think there isn’t a better way to know of. But no one seems to acknowledge my efforts. Some in fact reject them.

I will heap burning coals upon their heads. I will love them despite their misuse and betrayal of me. I will be the better friend. I will leave them with nothing ill to say of me.