How do you compete with something intangible? How can you fight with something that you can't touch or even see? How do you fight a feeling? How do you win a bout with an unknown enemy? What kind of weapons can you use?

But then the real question here is what's the point? What's the purpose?

Nothing and no one matters anyway.

It only takes one negative incident to drive out a beautiful experience. It only takes a second to turn the page and by the time you realise that you never finished reading the last page, it's time to return the book. It only takes a single conversation to forget the moments that made the day. It only takes one person to enter to forget that someone was already there. It only takes a minute to forget something sweet that was said or heard.

It's this flimsiness of being that makes life the roller coaster it is.

The thing is, I want to get off.

The chink of glasses. Candlelight flickering off their faces. Perfectly cooked food. And most important - the smiles.

They were smiling, the both of them. Happy, glowing faces. They looked like no one else existed out of their bubble. No one else mattered. Nothing else mattered. They looked into each other’s eyes and they smiled. They held hands across the table as they spoke. It was a completely unconscious gesture. Their feet grazed each other under the table, as if they wanted to reassure themselves that they were actually sitting there and it wasn’t a dream. They sipped their wine and conversation flowed just as smoothly. She gestured as she talked and her fingers unconsciously played with the chain she wore around her neck. He couldn’t get enough of her; she was the one he wanted, needed, had. He touched her fingers and laughed in response to something she said.

But scratch the facade a little and the reality reveals itself. The picture is rosy, beautiful, untrue. The wine helps to ease the pain. The hands touch because they need to say good bye. They are actors both of them, putting on the performances of their lives. Pretending, acting, performing. They push their thoughts away, they can be thought tomorrow. They push their sadness away, the tears can be shed in the dead of the night. They push their fears away, those will be dealt with in the nightmares. They hide the doubts away, tonight is supposed to be perfect.

Tonight is supposed to be perfect and the reality can be held at bay for a little while longer. The wine is too good, the food too delicious, the conversation too interesting, the intimacy too natural.

They are consummate actors.

And this is the performance of a lifetime.

Because sometimes, you need the lie to deal with the reality.

Behind all sarcasm is a grain of truth. Every joke has a fact as its basis. Every wisecrack, every mean comment, though meant in jest is based on a thought which is in turn based on a truth. A joke is an exaggeration of the truth.

So when you look behind the laughter and the fun; when you dig deeper; hidden away is that tiny grain of truth.

Man is a social animal. He feeds off other humans. he needs relationships to stay alive. He needs interaction and communication, of any kind to survive.

The problem is, these interactions and relationships are often just as detrimental to a person's survival as starvation or dehydration. Because some relationships sap your energy and peace of mind. They play with your head and make you forget who you are. They change you, fundamentally, on a core level. They make you doubt and question and lie and fear. They make you trust and believe. Worst of all, they make you hope, for more than you ever will get. They make you expect. And just as easily, they destroy your expectations. Kapow!

Relationships are a catch 22 situation. You can't live without them. And they destroy you when you are in them.

Sand castles

Building sandcastles was something many of us loving doing; painstakingly filling the small plastic bucket with wet sand and then overturning it, hoping that the castle would stand. Then came adding new towers and floors. Also, who can forget the moat of crocodiles? We would make sure nothing crumbled down by adding sand, adding water. But then the waves would come. And all that work would come to naught because after all, what is sand when compared to the sea?

As children though, we wouldn't give up, believing that we could defeat the waves. And we'd move a little further back and start anew.

Life feels a lot like this. The careful filling up of the bucket and then overturning it with fingers crossed, hoping the castle will stand and the risk pays off. That jubilant feeling when it does. And then the reinforcements to make stronger. Building it little by little. Only to have it all washed away in the blink of an eye by the relentless waves.

The difference now is that it gets more difficult to begin again each time the castle is destroyed. Lessons are learnt the hard way. Experiences are remembered and the hope dims. That childish faith in starting anew and believing that the castle will stand this time around is gone.

Because how many times will you keep trying and how many times can you just believe?

Life after all, is as relentless and tireless as the waves. And we aren't children any more.

Living with someone you love can be lonelier than living entirely alone. When the one you love doesn't love you.

- Cat on a hot tin roof.

This quote has stuck with me ever since I saw the movie. And every time I read it, the sheer honesty and truth of the statement hits me.

It doesn't have to be living together. It can just mean being together with a person who doesn't love you like you love them.

It doesn't have to be love in a romantic sense. It can be friendship too. With people who don't appreciate you.

In the end, love unrequited is loneliness, rejection and a whole lot more.