The Game of Love

In third grade, I voluntarily wrote a persuasive essay begging my mother to buy me the Harry Potter book. Needless to say, I was a big nerd, a real book worm. I could sit on the couch and read for hours upon hours, stopping only to eat, sleep, or use the bathroom. But now, reading has somehow lost its appeal, and I’ve decided that that’s something I want to change. So I decided that I would set a goal to read at least three books this summer. Sure, three doesn’t seem like a lot, but I’m taking baby steps here. Three books means I should finish one book for each month of my summer break. I am now almost two months into break, and so far I have read a grand total of one. A gay romance novel. And a very explicit one, at that.

So I finally forced myself to revisit the library last week and wandered into an adult fiction aisle. As I was browsing the shelves, I realized that every book that I randomly picked up was about love. And that, my friend, is  how I ended up with three romance novels sprawled about my house.

First up is a typical love story for the hopeless romantic: boy meets girl, boy immediately falls in love with girl, boy goes to great lengths to win girl over… that’s as far as I’ve gotten so far, but I can already tell that these two lovebirds are going to end up together, happily ever after. Now that’s all fine and dandy except for one thing: it’s not real. I used to buy into all this true love and destiny bullsh*t. Romance fiction authors feed us crap about how we’re going to meet our soulmates on a spontaneous plane ride one day, and we’re going to fall madly in love, and all our problems will cease to exist. I used to eat this stuff up for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and the thought never crossed my mind that it was all fiction, that there was no knight in shining armor waiting for me to one day buy a plane ticket in the seat right next to his.

Finally I realize why I stopped reading. The only kinds of books I ever really enjoyed now nauseate me. They are sickeningly sweet to the point where none of it is believable anymore. Maybe if I was young again and didn’t know what real life was like, I could allow myself to delve into this little fantasy world again. But the truth is, everything that I’ve learned these past couple of years gives me cause to believe that these stories could never possibly be real.

This leads me to my theory about love and relationships. The people who know me are probably wondering what in the world I know about love. Well, I have news for all of you: you really don’t know me that well, and I know a lot more about love than you think.

I don’t condone playing with people’s hearts, but in life, sometimes you have to play mind games. All is fair in love and war, and etc. Let a guy know he’s got you right away, and he thinks you’re easy; he’ll use you, never call you again, and then think it’s your fault for being too naive. You decide that next time, you’ll make him wait. But then you make the mistake of making him wait too long. The next thing you know, he’s moved on to the next girl, and you’re back at square one: alone.

The thing we all need to understand here is that males mature slower than females. While we gals are at one stage of our lives, the boys are still lagging three steps behind us. So it’s not surprising to find that when women start looking for Mr. Right, the men that they meet are only looking for Miss Right Now. And when we hear that famous line, “There’s plenty of fish in the sea,” that doesn’t really help because one catch after another, we realize that all of these fish seem to be the same.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that all guys are out to break our hearts. I’m not going to argue with the fact that there are nice boys out there – the kind of boys you can take home to your parents, the kind of boys you can marry and not divorce after two weeks, the kind of boys who will tell you they love you and actually mean it. But these kinds of guys are rare. It takes years for boys to grow up into men. So if you find him, you hang on to him, and you never let go. And then you pick up the phone, and you tell me exactly where you found him, so that I can get one too!

If only all guys were emotionally mature enough to fit into the above category, our lives (or at least our love lives), would be perfect. Unfortunately, our love lives are much more complicated.

Let’s face it: boys and girls alike love a challenge. We all want to feel like we’ve won a prize. But of course, no one wants a challenge that they can’t eventually conquer. After about half a dozen rejections, I think I can safely say that enough is enough – fun’s over. I mean, there’s only so many ego bruises a person can take. So what’s the lesson in all this? The art of keeping someone’s attention is knowing exactly when to stop playing hard-to-get and start getting down to business.

I think that when two people realize that they have honest feelings for each other, they should stop with the games and get serious, start committing to each other. If you’re still in the phase of hooking up with random people at the bar, don’t be wondering why you’re not in a serious relationship – the answer is obvious. The kinds of guys who will share that one special night with you do not want you for more than that one night; that’s not the kind of person you need, nor deserve. Fortunately, most of those boys eventually do grow up, or at least that’s what I’ve got to believe. And these boys end up being the perfect little gentlemen you can fit into the category with all the other good little boys of the world.

Of course, there still exists the one guy who will never learn to commit, never learn how to not cheat on his girlfriend, and never learn how to be a real man. And there’s a name for this special little guy: douchebag. Who knows? Maybe he’s got a little too much testosterone. Maybe he watched The Hills and thought, “Well if Spencer can do it, why can’t I?” I may never find out the answer to why a guy thinks he can treat women like dirt and still come out on top. Let’s just take solace in the fact that this is the guy who is going to end up living alone with 4 divorces under his belt, 5 different STDs – also under his belt (pun intended!), and a lifetime of regret.