Once Burnt, Twice Shy

I actually hate that saying but it was the first thing that jumped to mind when I wanted to name this blog so whatever. Anyway, I'm scared of getting into a romantic relationship because I've seen quite a few of my friends burnt badly by being in relationships.

I'm fairly sure that if we looked at the numbers we would find that the majority of relationships fail, but that isn't what is causing my apprehension. I have not one, not two but three friends who were in what they would classify as fulfilling, long term relationships only for the relationship to end rather unexpectedly for reasons initially unknown and probably still not understood.

In all of these cases my friends were male and were totally committed to the relationship. In two of the cases these friends were seriously considering marriage and I would consider these friends of mine to be good men who didn't deserve the heartache they had to endure.

Now I understand the idea that it was much better to have found out that your significant other isn't as committed as you are before marriage than after, but in all of these cases the relationship in question lasted for over 2 years, and in one of the cases it lasted for almost 4 years.

Now surely after a year of dating someone you know them well enough to be able to say if you would be able to live with them at all, if not for the rest of your life. And if the answer is "No, I can't live with this person" then isn't it your responsibility to be honest and either work on your relationship or part ways amicably?

But in all three cases my friends trusted their partner completely and felt that they were being totally honest with each other. Which means that either the other person just hadn't thought about it or the other person had decided that being in a relationship was convenient enough that they didn't want to upset their own lives.

I understand that I'm seeing this all from the outside and it is tainted by my experiences. Perhaps I'm being overly critical, but it seems as if someone was being dishonest...

So what is the answer? I don't know. Let's not lie to ourselves, the divorce rate in the world is fucking high and I don't think that's because there are a lot of people having shotgun weddings. In fact, I don't know if there is any sort of pattern that can be found which contributes to divorces but I can say that based on the relationships I've observed and the statistics I've seen I don't know if I believe in marriage. More to the point, I don't know if I believe in romantic relationships.

Based on what I've seen people put in an immense amount of effort and it seldom pays off with more than unbearable heartache. My mother thought she knew my father until one day he said "I want to be a woman". Now he wears women's clothing and is getting his cock cut off.

Truth is that I've never experienced a romantic relationship, and I don't know if I want to. I'm just not sold on the idea. Perhaps that's why the only relationship I'm likely to enter [at this point in time] is one where both parties are as independant as possible with an almost clinical approach as to who does what, when and why. I honestly don't know...