All's Fair in Love and War

Who coined the phrase all is fair in Love and War? Do you think they fully understood the implications of what they were saying? Furthermore, do people actually follow the phrase or just turn it out whenever another lodges a complaint. If so, do they feel vindicated or slightly foolish?

Which brings to mind another commonly spoken line; fools in love, there’s even an old song, Why do fools fall in love. Does this mean people in love are inane, foolish or silly? At times I will admit, I have felt quite foolish while in the midst of an affair.

So if all is fair in love and war, and fools fall in love, does that mean that only Fools who are in love with war would deign to ever use the line, all’s fair in love and war? You would never speak those words to a lover. However if you are absolutely ruthless in the art of winning said lover’s heart, well perhaps one may think this phrase while convincing themselves that all that they do can be justified by Love.

Pat Benatar claims Love is a battlefield. Why are the two so intertwined? Love seems to be something alien to war, there is no love given in war, war is destruction plain and simple. There is a thin line between love and hate. Does this mean we only pick those we’d love to hate; fools in love that fall out of love, turn to hate and emotional warfare.

What if instead of allowing ourselves to create such destruction and misery, we instead do our best to remember what it was like at the beginning of the love affair, what it was that was good and attracted us to our lover. Would we remember to respect each other and make an ending easier for both? I am not claiming a moral high ground. I know I have been disrespectful and unkind. It is easy to do when suffering. However, a good friend wrote a piece on marriage this week which really made me think a little. What if part of the reason for such irrational and hurtful behaviour is that the heart does not easily fall out of love? Your head may tell you it is wrong but the heart doesn’t always want to let go. So one’s psyche combats this by doing its best to kill Love.

Perhaps today’s society is too consumed with the idea of love to actually be able to recognize it properly? In my culture there is no word for lover or spouse, they simply are the one that walks with me in rough translation. When did we stop walking with each other? When did it all become a race to the altar, a race to a relationship? Are we so concerned with having one that we fail to notice complexities and never truly experience our partners? Really think how often one recently out of love states, it’s like they are a completely different person. Well yeah, of course! If we tell ourselves what we want to hear about a person, and then the blinders come off and we see someone else standing in front of us, maybe it’s not that they changed, it’s that we did not take the time to truly get to know and understand that person before committing to them.

I know this, I am a bitch. I am loving and complex. I want love and it scares the hell out of me at the same time. Sex is important, but so is the sheer bliss of long lingering kisses and hugs that make you feel safe and warm. I am resolved to turn my life upside down and start over, mayhap it is not too late for me to stop being such a coward and go find love, recognize it, grab it and never let it go. When I do, remind me to walk and not run.