Confessions of A Naughty Girl

The Gambler's Guide To Hedging Your Bets

On the heels of my last post, I realized that I wasn't done talking about playing the field. Oh no, not done at all.

A few days after aforementioned post, I was having a nice chat with an old boyfriend, who at one point in the conversation, referred to himself as a "pawn in my game". I was mystified - a pawn? A game? I never even learned to play chess, and I sure as hell always cheated at checkers. It just seemed wrong that someone would think so low of me as to assume that I just got into as much trouble as I could, only to bounce Kings off of one another. Hmm...I could be wrong, but this smelled like a post all its own.

Allow me to state for the record: humans are not pawns.

But as a single girl just trying to enjoy life, let me state for the record that the whole entire world of dating and hooking up is definitely a game.

Let's not deny ourselves - in the world of relationships, we're all players. We figure out what we want (or who we want), we do our research, we hedge our bets, and when the time is right, we go after who/what we want, or the Payoff. There's nothing wrong with that.

So when you're faced with choices, you need to do a little thinking first. I like to call this "hedging your bets". It's a smart and calculating thing to do, if you can handle it.

Allow me to provide you with an example. This past weekend, somewhere in between my first rum and Coke and the exact point at which I blacked out, I was hanging out with friends and met this guy. The guy, who I'll refer to as D from now on, was all over my shit. He, acting like the player we all are, had seen something he liked, and was going for it. Can't blame him, as my milkshake has known to occasionally bring boys to the yard.

But unfortunately for poor D, I had my eye elsewhere. There was nothing wrong with D - he's perfectly nice, perfectly sweet, but not my type - and coincidentally friends with someone else I liked. So when the opportunity presented itsself, and he kindly asked if he could take me out to dinner sometime, I told him that I had to be honest with him and that I was into another guy.

(And for those of you who have known me for a long time, we all know that the fact that I've held out for someone else is definitely a new learned behavior, so do as I say, not as I've done. And doesn't this serve as some sort of evidence of my evolution? I'm not a shit anymore! I'm an honest girl!)

This, my friends, was a perfect example of "hedging my bets". It is the act of easily being able to have someone, but instead of capitalizing on the opportunity because - hey, let's face it, sex is great, and so is a free dinner - we hold out for what, or who, we really want. And fortunately, in that instance, I got it. And all was well with the world. I was honest with the Gambler, I went for the Payoff, and I beat the House. Not literally. This is not soft porn for Christ's sake, it's a post.

Now, sometimes the gamble doesn't pay. Sometimes the odds are just stacked against you and the House wins. Or, depending on the circumstance, we make the wrong choice and go for what's in front of us because we don't want to hold out for more. And you know what, that's okay. Shit happens. But as long as we don't lose sight of what we want in the long-term, we should be copacetic with knowing that we do the best we can.

My point is, whether you like it or not, if you're in this world and you don't have a teammate, you're forced into the game. So play it hard, and play it smart.

And bring lots of money. That couldn't hurt.

posted by KA @ 7:59 PM