Because of certain incidents that happened lately,
I was led to revisit a thought-provoking post by one Window-Shopper.

In this post of his,
he mentioned

男人在感情的王国里，绝对是个昏君。
女人只要肯奉承，
他什么都答应.

To this,
a certain friend of mine concluded
"This one i strongly agree. If he's not so 好骗, it juz means he dun love you enough. haha!"

Ah...the truth of it.

It is ultimately a game of deception,
a game of strategy,
a matter of who has the upper hand in this game of complex emotional manipulation
is it not?

The value of the stakes could be as high as the sky,
or it can be as cheap as the air we have around us.
It all boils down to sharp foresight
and calculated maneuvers.

In the words of the Jigsaw murderer of my favourite gore series, SAW,
if you understand how the human minds work,
there's no such things as chance.
The game will play out the way it's supposed to.

Love.
The only way to prove it is no longer the surprise of a dozen roses.
A dozen beautiful red roses are merely a symbol of how much passion the game holds for him.
As bright red as the crimson blossoms,
and as short-lived.

The racing of heartbeats,
the silly giggling feat that we're taught to expect from love by teen idol dramas
the sweetness of romance that we're socialised into believing by
the ever popular sweet valley series that I'm sure every girl has read at some point in her life,
are merely the very deepest secrets of girls that have been exploited into balance sheet figures,
the tools used to bring unsuspecting preys onto the altar of consumerism.

When we were younger,
we have all been victims of this prescribed state of idealism.
I don't know about you,
but I vividly remember the many toilet conversations I had with various girlfriends
throughout my teenage life about the criteria our future partners has to have.
More often than not,
we'd be muttering things like
"He doesn't have to be rich or handsome, as long as he truly loves me."

You see?
The folly of youth,
the evils of media.

22 years and wiser,
love and being treated well isn't even on the list anymore.
Compatibility.
Looks-wise,
Intelligence-wise,
character-wise,
lifestyle-wise,
the practical indicators of a lasting relationship,
has sadly become the realistic benchmarks of choice for rational evaluation.

I attended a 20 yr old birthday party over the weekend,
and once again,
a familiar feeling of nostalgia washed over me.
Despite all my bitter bitchiness,
I do admire the carefree vibrancy of youth.
The courage to go all out to live, flirt and love.
Unknowingly, that spark of hopefulness has somehow gradually
been eroded away by the inevitable process of ageing.

It's amazing what time can do to a woman.
She can be the stupidest person on earth,
and still have a steeper learning curve than the smartest man around.
It just takes once,
to change the way a woman thinks.

Selfishness takes root,
and we learn to live as men do,
we learn to think as men do,
we learn to love as men do,
but more importantly,
we learn to feed ourselves with excuses with the same ferocity men do,
and silence our conscience at the right time.

All these,
and still behave the way a woman does.

To others,
we might be perceived as vicious.
But really,
we're just instinctively protecting ourselves.
Trust comes at too high a price these days.

You watch football.
Haven't you heard?
The best defense is a good offense.

If men can do it,
why can't we?