These posts of the last few weeks brought up a very attractive young woman who works at one of these businesses I patronize.  I think that I will try to not go to this business at any time I think she may work there.  I just saw this fork in the road open up today, and I  think i want to take a road where I greatly minimize the chance that I will see her.

I haven't done anything wrong in my opinion, but as of about an hour or two ago, I saw that I had before me a tradeoff.  If I don't go to this person's place of employment when I figure she may work there, I would essentially give up the hope  that I could get to know her better and form a friendship with her.  In exchange for giving that up, I would have back in fuller measure the life I have built up as a single person that involves my art projects, my music projects, the pursuit of more constructive friendships, and the overall sense that I'm happier not pursuing the kinds of friendships with women where I'm constantly wondering whether or not I am just barking up the wrong tree yet again.

I know, actions speak louder than words, Rich, but I just wanted to get this off of my chest.  I've busted this kind of move before in the not-too-distant past-refraining from seeing some woman I was attracted to- and I found myself very satisfied with the results.

In other news, the latest issue of Richy Vegas Comics, issue # 18, The Legend of Richy Vegas, part 5, is now on the zine shelf at the main library downtown.  That's the Austin Public Library.  Of course, one may order this issue and other from this web site, or I'll catch you at one of the zine fests or cons where I will have a table in the coming months. 

In one of Dr. David Burns' books, I think I refer to Intimate Connections, the author talks about a how a willingness to risk losing someone  proves essential in that person's willingness to hang around for a while.  Simply put, a person who displays an overly fearful demeanor at the prospect of losing a potential intimate partner will not come off well to that desired person, and that increases the likelihood that the valued person will leave. I'm not going to assume that someone or other in my world wants to get to know me better at this time, but this blog allows me to practice speaking my mind in the event that the day may come where that is the case, and hey, maybe that is the case right now.  I just don't know.

Since about the age twenty-two, I've had a steady diet of women trying to punish me for past misdeeds against other women.  The first time I recall this happening, it involved a couple of girlfriends of someone I had a fixation on in high school.  So, years later, in college, I found out that another girlfriend of these women represented herself as available and interested in order to try to punish me for my weirdness from years past.

Another notable time occurred in my last semester of undergrad, when "Linda" feigned interest in me in class.  On the second to the last day of class, she talked with some other girls about tattoos, and icily mentioned that her BOYFRIEND had a tattoo of... Linda then came into the class where I stood and drew the model, and she stomped her feet repeatedly and demonstratively as if to symbolically stomp on my heart.  In recent times it occurred to me that she was trying to punish me back then for the time I made a crude sexual proposition to "Wanda" in February of 1987.  I suspect that a girl from that clique of friends that knew about that incident made sure that word got round about it in the art school.

Another notable time this seemed to happen occurred after I returned from grad school.  A friend of mine named Jim seemed really amused by my behavior towards Wanda and related a version of that incident to anyone within earshot for like, the entire time I spent in grad school in New York City before returning.  I'm still picking up the pieces from that time, and today I will work on the next five issues of "The Legend of Richy Vegas" that detail my descent into madness.

Another notable time involves the time I worked at a restaurant in 1998/ 1999.  I tell my version of what went down in issue number 4 of Richy Vegas Comics, "Anita You're the Reason I'm Not In Prison."  I published that comic in late 2010, but the other parties' version of what went down had been circulating for years.  The book seemed to speak well for me on that score, because I noticed a change in the demeanor of at least one person whom I assumed instigated a lot of the trouble I faced.  I noticed a change on other fronts as well.

Now, when faced with these kinds retaliatory behaviors repeatedly, I've come to a couple of conclusions.  The wrong way to handle these behaviors involves trying to retaliate in what I consider fair and equal measure for whatever wrong I've felt these parties' have perpetrated on me.  What would constitute a more constructive approach?  Well, I believe that speaking my mind about what I see in regards to these situations would help.

I think the factors that unite every one of these actions taken by these women- and quite a few men as well- I think these people make these decisions based on two factors, and two factors primarily: 1) that I seem vulnerable to such an attack and, 2) that they  think they can get away with such an attack with no negative consequences.  These two beliefs stem from the socioeconomic realities and stigma of what it means to have a major mental illness in this society, and not so much to do with any actual wrongs I may have done.  These people make these decisions because they feel they are justified in their course of action and that they will derive a great deal of satisfaction in the outcome.  I would guess that the idea that I am not like them, let's say that I'm subhuman to their fully human, aids in this whole thought process.  That is a very ugly side of human nature for me to see over, and over, and over again through the years.

So, if I  suspect an attractive young or youngish woman in my world had taken something of an interest in me through my deft handling of such an attempted aggression by themselves and others against me-and I'm not saying that is going on right now, but just suppose- what should I do?  Should I retaliate in what I consider a fair and equal measure?  I think not.  My experience in years past tells me that the other party will not feel as if they deserve to be treated that way, and that I will feel bad after I behave that way towards them, and that such actions will cause a lot more problems than they solve.  If I had a chance to get to know such a person better, I hope that I would have the courage to broach such a subject at an opportune time, using language they could accept and behaving in a manner that they could accept.  Again, I think that not having the courage to take such a course of action would only serve to make me come off as afraid of losing that person.  If I learned anything from my time with Sara in 1988, I learned how to accept and even embrace an outcome where myself and the concerned other party do not become boyfriend and girlfriend.

I think I can understand if someone out there doesn't want to hear about the kinds things I've just brought up in this post on some supposed future date with me.  Maybe that explains why I've NEVER, EVER dated someone who has come after me in such an adversarial manner.  I mean, lots of women have totally come after me, but I've been intimate with only a handful of women not that many times and dated even fewer of those I've been with.  If anyone sees themselves in what I've described in the above paragraphs in regards to stigma and wants to beg off right here and now....well, okay.

I'm going to preach this sermon once more, because I find myself in this situation yet again.  It looks as if I busted a party or parties in the middle of some cruel rejection game they tried to get going on me.  As is the usual these days, it's employees of businesses I patronize on a day to day basis.  I'm getting pretty good at this, and like I've said before, recovery from my issues seems to take a progressive route, in  that I just get better and better at it.  That means these young attractive women I can go on about don't have much of an opportunity to treat me in as shabby or abusive a manner as they would like to do.

Now, should I forgive these people?  Right off the bat?  I don't think that constitutes genuine forgiveness.  Past experiences with these awkward situations tell me that a sudden, unilateral effort to forgive these young, attractive women after these episodes would amount to myself wanting something material in exchange for conferring forgiveness on these women.  That something would include love, sex, companionship etc.  My experiences tell me that trying to forgive someone in hopes of getting something material in return is not real forgiveness.  The behaviors I and the other parties could engage in, and not getting those material things in return for my "forgiveness," just led to more trouble for me.

What do I do instead?  I think I will just go about my day to day routines.  That would include going about my business at these coffee shops and restaurants and other places.  I can go any time I want, no matter which employees work there, because I didn't do anything wrong, and if I just go about my business and don't bother anyone, I think we can all accept that.  These women have the right to earn a living just as much as anyone else does.  I've had people actually apologize for stuff in the past, and then I would say, "Okay."  I think that would make for a more genuine effort at reconciliation over the idea that I just confer forgiveness because I'm such a good guy.

In 2013 I did a little temp work for a friend's print company.  During that time, I discovered they had a stunning Latina receptionist.  I decided to look for temp work elsewhere.  I worked for that place for a week, and when I couldn't get more work for the next couple of weeks after that first week, I got a temp job driving all over creation washing those damn dishes for country clubs and company cafeterias.  I didn't die from my decision to cut off continued contact with that print company.  I thought about that girl tonight.  I didn't die from never going on even one date with her.  I'm just sayin'. 

I gave a woman from my past a derogatory pseudonym in my books and on my blog, but for the purposes of this post, I'll call her Linda.  In the Summer of 1988 I took two art classes with Linda.  At some point during that last semester of my undergrad career, I decided to cut Sara loose.  I decided to make it about Linda, because she started talking to me and being friendly to me. 
 
On the second-to-last day of class, I stood in the life drawing studio with the class and drew from the model pose.  At some point Linda stood outside with two other women and they talked about tattoos.  Linda said in an icy tone that her boyfriend had a tattoo of,,, whatever his tattoo was.   Linda then came into the class, stood near me, and stomped her feet in a demonstrative manner.  I took this to mean she was, like, stomping on my heart, because that's what it felt like.

I'd cut Sara loose a couple of weeks earlier, and I was determined to stick to my guns on that one.  So, I continued to make it about Linda through the Fall semester when I would go to the art building to talk to teachers about grad school.  I saw Linda at graduation in the winter, and I called her once a few days later and asked her out.  She said yes, but that she had a boyfriend.  I declined her invitation of friendship, because I felt my feelings were too strong for her.

I worried all the while after that about my strong feelings for Linda, because in those days trouble seemed to find me rather easily.  One day in June, my mom asked me to get rid of a stump in a yard of a rent house she owned.  When she told me the house's location, the street corner, I recognized it as a location near Linda's house.  The way my mom had a touched, pleading manner about her when she said the house's location led me to believe that Linda had had contact with her at some point.  

My gesture towards Linda, when I had called her and then said I had to let her go, had come off as very sweet to many people.  I had a way of making these women feel valued by me at these kind of awkward times, because these gestures I performed came after the object of my desire had been very cruel to me somehow.

Anyway, when my mom told me the address of the rent house, I lost it, kind of.  I got a little axe, and at the rent house I would wave the axe and shake my fist in the direction of Linda's house  as I tried to chop the stump up.  There was a middle-aged Latina woman in the yard of the house next door with a couple of small kids.  Sometime during my display she seemed to rush the kids inside.

From what I gather now, Linda had heard about this incident from this neighbor, and connected it to herself.  So, what was meant to be a gesture that would only have meaning for me became something else entirely.  All these years later, I connected some disparate attempts to attack me in myriad ways to this incident.  I've talked about the Invisible Woman and all of that, and the belief I had last fall that I had an internet presence that I did not create myself and that I did not consent to.

This last deal I talked about lately, the latest Unavailable Woman Deal, I wonder.  Is that tied to this incident from so many years ago?  Something of consequence that may have happened from that incident in my mom's yard, is that Linda may have miscarried.  That would certainly explain the depth of vindictive animosity I seem to have run up against.

Last Winter, I introduced myself to Linda's ex-husband.  I said to him that I'd had a run-in with Linda all those years ago.  He kind of chuckled and then left the party with his wife.  I don't know if this animosity towards me is as universal as those who would seek to attack me would like me to believe, if I'm to judge by Linda's ex-husband response to my attempt to broach the subject.

If remorse is a type of compassion, then I have compassion for Linda's plight all these years later, but all I can do is offer myself for an adult level dialogue, because no matter what did or did not happen all those years ago, I still have the right to defend myself against this weird feminine aggression that seems to come up from time to time.  

I had some deal with a woman that I just got out of.  The last two posts talked about the Unavailable Woman Deal, and this last deal certainly looked like one of those.  I'm out, and I'm glad I'm out.  Now what?  Well, back when I would experience a more crash and burn outcome from the Unavailable Woman Deal, I would then try to rebound.  I never had any success at rebounding- finding someone to date soon after these ordeals, I mean.

I believe that I would just come across to new women as needy and desperate in my efforts to rebound from these bad experiences, and I also seemed to make poor decisions about the women I chose to try to execute these rebound moves with.  I would seem to choose another unavailable woman to try to rebound with.  It was as if an unavailable woman angel would just move from body to body to  body. So, rebounding is out.  As I've said many times in my blog, most of my dealings with women have nothing to do with love, girlfriends, or relationships for or against.  Most of my dealings with women have only to do with intelligent decision making.  So, out with rebounding, in with intelligent decision making.  If I make intelligent decisions about individual women in the first place, which I feel I did a couple of days ago, I will not feel as much of a need to rebound.  That is all.

Update:  So it seemed as if an unavailable woman angel would just move from body to body to body.  I thought about that statement just now.  It seems just as true today as it seemed about the older days.  A post last week talked about how I seem to have to make decisions about one woman after another after another, and how the decision seems to invariably consist of deciding to let them go.  So, the world still hasn't changed for me on that front.  I'm the only one that's changed.  I cannot emphasize how often I think of my dealings with Sara in the Spring of 1988, and how thinking of those times seems to emotionally prepare me for the harsh realities about women I'm attracted to these days.

My post from earlier today outlined my proposal to this very attractive young woman in my world.  I offered her the Unavailable Woman Deal.  The Unavailable Woman has me bending over backwards to accommodate her and I really, really try to work things out so that there is an outcome that benefits us both and that makes both of us happy.  In exchange for my efforts, the other party gets to do whatever the hell they want.  

Well, she can still do whatever the hell she wants.  I've got no problem with this young woman doing whatever the hell she wants in relation to me.  Especially since I have withdrawn from my end of the bargain.  I just decided that there has to be more to dating and relationships with women than signing on for Unavailable Woman Deals.

I traced my mental and emotional activity that lead me to sign on for this deal with this particular young woman: She's one of the best looking women in my day to day environment-if not THE best looking.  I decided  to make it about her.  I decided this deal was a go after some pretty minor interactions with her, and then I signed on for the classic Unavailable Woman Deal.  An oldie but a goodie.  But, as I realized today what I had done once again, I decided to withdraw from my end of the bargain.  That is all.

In my last posts of these past few weeks I've brought up a young, very attractive woman in my world whom I decided that I like enough to give a chance.  Now, I can't say right now that this person is unavailable, but she has attributes that make her seem...unavailable-ish.  She's really young, she's really pretty, I don't know anything about her, and she works at a business where getting to know her better proves challenging.

So, I will offer her the Unavailable Woman Deal.  I've talked about the Unavailable Woman Deal many times, but I will recap.  The Unavailable Woman Deal consists of myself bending over backwards to accommodate this person and trying my level best to see if I can come up with a solution that benefits myself and this young lady and is in both our best interest.  In exchange for my efforts, the other party gets to do whatever the hell they want.  Like I've said many times, there's something about this deal these young ladies really like.  I can't quite put my finger on the "why" of why they like this deal so much, but they do.

Back in the day, I would sign up for this deal unwittingly, and there could be tears.  I became conscious of how this deal could take shape with someone before I realized it in 2016.  Knowledge is power.  So, I'm just going to get out in front of this deal this time, and if she takes advantage of her end of the bargain in the manner these young, very attractive women typically take advantage, then I will cut her loose like always.  All the young lovelies get this deal from me at first, and it's entirely up to them how they keep their end of it up.  Not my fault that I feel compelled to make intelligent decisions when I realize what's going on on their end.

At SVA in 1990/1991, I decided to make it about a girl named Ann Marie after the Thanksgiving break of 1990.  A crash and burn fixation on Gwen immediately preceded this decision.  Ann Marie avoided me all the following Spring because she considered me a loose canon, I guess.  I let her go at the end of my graduating semester in the Spring of 1991.  On those last days of classes at the school, she had occasion to walk by me in the hall.  She seemed apprehensive about seeing me under those circumstances, and I didn't force anything, and I let her pass me by in the hall.  

Other female undergraduate students seemed to indicate to me that this was the right thing to do.  They smiled at me and greeted me warmly in the immediate aftermath of my encounter in the hall with Ann Marie.  A couple of weeks later I walked on the sidewalk in mid-town Manhattan.  As I crossed a crowded busy crosswalk, I saw Ann Marie looking at me and walking in the direction towards me.  I smiled as if to say to her, "You see, I care enough for you not to pressure you about stuff, and now look."  She seemed in shock as she passed me by.

Based on later interactions with other students and Tommy, my thesis advisor, I guessed that Ann Marie worked at an art gallery that represented Tommy and happened to reside near that intersection where I encountered her.  In June of 1991, I went to that gallery to check things out.  This was after I'd not seen Ann Marie for several weeks after that encounter in the intersection.  My trip to the gallery represented a last ditch effort to get with her, because up until then, I had the expectation that I'd have heard from her somehow, because I figured that the whole gesture of letting Ann Marie go and then seeing her on the street would impress her enough that she would appear in my life somehow.  Like at my graduation ceremony, but she never did.

I went to the Gallery, asked the guy behind the counter if one of my former fellow grad student classmates was working that day, the guy behind the counter said that Lance was on vacation. i asked a question or two about the current exhibit. I heard an attractive-sounding, young-sounding woman on the phone at a desk through an entryway behind the front desk.  I couldn't see this woman, and I wondered if it was Ann Marie.  She finished talking on the phone as I looked at a brochure.  The guy behind the front desk cleared his throat, I waited a few seconds for the woman from the back to appear up front or something, then I walked out when nothing like that happened.

Fuck her!  It was as much about me giving her a chance as it was about her giving me a chance.  As I saw it, my move of letting her go at the end of the semester only to see her on the street was good enough for me, even if she implied that it wasn't good enough for her.  As fixated on her as I was, it took a lot of self-discipline to let go of the whole deal in that gallery and walk out like I did.  I went back to the gallery a week, week and a half later, but it was like flogging a dead horse by that point, and nothing came of it.

At this one business a few years ago, September 2014 into January 2015, to be exact, this virgin girl fired a shot across my bow.  I was fifty, and she was like, twenty-one.  After almost two months of hemming and hawing, where I spent a month trying to avoid this girl, I decided to just deal with it.  I took my time and gave her a chance, but I never asked her out.  I busted her dumbass little game instead, but I had totally given her a chance to prove herself worthy of my efforts to get to know her socially, and she came up short because I figured out that she just wanted to win at some stupid game.

There was this other much younger woman at this business just this past couple years.  I liked her lot.  I would allow myself to be around her to see if she had much of an interest in engaging with me.  Again, I didn't try to force any interaction.  That one shook out the way it did when I asked this young woman a question related to her job a couple of times.  That was the most I'd ever talked to her over the several years period I would see her at this business.  I must have really liked her to let things go on for so long and to not force anything that whole time.  Anyway, after I'd talked to her those couple of times about something related to her job, I went in there and she gave me this snarly look, as if I disgusted her somehow.  That ended that deal right then and there, and I said so on this blog. That was last March, I think.

I gave that virgin girl four whole months to prove herself somehow, and she never did, and I gave this more recent girl a long time, in large part because I put our whole deal on a back burner, but give her a chance I did.  There's this very young girl I talk about in these last several posts.  I must like her a lot, because I'm willing to give this deal some time too.  With that virgin girl, I really didn't have much choice but to just slow things down, pick my spots, and make a decision.  I could take her or leave her, really, but I did give her a chance.  I like this current girl enough to give her something of a chance.

But here's the deal.  It seems to fall on me to set the pace and the agenda in these deals, so I will do just that.  If this girl still works at this place in the coming days, weeks, or months, I will see to it that things are resolved to my satisfaction, if the past experiences I relate in the above passages are any indicator.  I may or may not make some big move to get with her, but I will probably resolve matters to my satisfaction.  

In 2016 I would eat at this pizza place near my house.  I made the acquaintance of a young woman who was a shift manager.  She typically worked behind the counter when I came in and ordered spaghetti and meatballs and like that.  One time she mentioned that she liked to hang out at a bar after work near her place of employment, and would I like to hang out with her one night.  I said that I don't drink, and she acted shot down.

A couple of weeks later, I offered to hang out at her bar to watch a presidential debate with her.  She said she'd meet me at the appointed hour, I went there, waited, and she never showed.  I just noted in this blog the next day that I didn't want to go into her place of employment right away and try to prove what a great guy I was about being stood up.  I thought that might come across as manipulative.  But, we got along after that, even though we never went out together.

Well, that's a near-miss worth noting, I guess.  When I say I'm uncomfortable about going into some young, attractive woman's place of employment and asking her out, I mean something different than what happened with this manager at this restaurant.  I mean, I don't want to go into some woman's place of employment with a predetermined PLAN of asking her out in front of god and everyone.  I think when I would do stuff like that, I would have done just as well to walk up to said attractive young female employee and drop my pants in front of her.  

But, this time in the pizza place, it was established that this young woman had enough of and interest in me to invite me to her favorite hangout.  Now, someone doesn't necessarily have to ASK ME OUT to reassure me that they have an interest in me (it helps), but some kind of equivalent gesture would be nice.

Look, Sara and me not asking her out, ever, is not the ONLY experience I've had with women that I consider relevant.  But, when I'm talking about approaching some much younger, really attractive young woman in her place of employment for such social things, maybe a somewhat unplanned, tit-for-tat escalation would prove much more preferable to all concerned over me trying to carry the whole load myself.