What is love?

A long time ago my FEW called me a robot. She said that I had no emotions. That I didn't feel.

I, of course, took that as a compliment.

I have always valued rationality over emotions. Mr. Spock was my hero. Even to this day I would rather solve problems through rational discourse rather than screaming and shouting.

But that doesn't seem to work too well with women.

Women want me to make an emotional commitment to them. And I find this is something I just cannot do.

I can't seem to lose control. I can't seem to want to give up everything. to fight dragons, to say, "Fuck it. I will do this because I love this woman."

I can't seem to lose or give up emotional control.

It wasn't always this way of course.

In my younger days I had no problems in doing that. I would give my all for a woman. I was willing to do anything, make any changes to myself and my lifestyle to be with someone. But as I grew older, that changed.

I guess the big change was somewhere in 2001. A bad breakup in 2000, followed by an even worse one in 2002, which led to depression and an attempt at suicide where I learned that 24 tabs of Panadol are not enough to kill you, just give you bad heartburn.

Since then I have been uable to feel anything romantic for anyone. There is no rush of emotion.

I find it impossible to get that can't-eat, can't- sleep, reach-for-the-stars, over-the-fence, World Series kind of stuff.

I sometimes envy those who can. I envy those who can actually feel something. Those whose wires haven't been overloaded and burnt out. Those who can unconditionally love someone. And feel pain when it is going wrong.

As my friend the Toymaker asked me once, Would you rather be unhappy with her, or happy without her?

Apparently my answering - without any thought or hesitation - that I would rather be happy, meant that I was not in love.

This is not to say that I don't care for, or even love the women in my life. It means that I am unable to get that deep emotional bond that many of the women in my life seem to want. I even find it difficult to say I love you to someone. Something that I was able to do before my marriage.

But that doesn't mean that I don't care. That I don't miss them when they leave - or to be more accurate, when I drive them away. It doesn't mean that I feel sad that they are no longer in my life.

It just means that I shrug, and move on.