Walking around or hanging round in my usual spots I spend most of my time in my head either processing my thoughts or intently focused on what ever I’m doing at that current moment. Not many things can take me out of my head in those moments except for interactions with others and one other thing. Whether it be church, my usual tuesday night bar, working at camp or any place where I have a lot of interactions with people. I’m minding my own business and then all of a sudden it happens, you find that really good looking girl that not only catches your attention but her personality is more than worth giving her a chance and suddenly you mutter the same lines you normally would when this type of thing happens, “Well shit, here we go again”.

“What do you mean by again?” everyone would ask but if you’ve been there then you already know what may happen again. That moment where your hopes start at the middle, slowly go up, shoot to the top with time and at the worse possible time they get shattered into millions of pieces that you have to pick up all on your own. You tell yourself you’ll never do it again the same way you tell yourself you’ll never drink again while having to endure the hangover of your life but within a few months you’re doing again and thus you further that bitter cycle of hope followed by heart break until you find that supposed Mrs. Right that people claim exists somewhere but is harder to find than the end of the rainbow and manages to slip away again and again like Princess Zelda or Princess Peach. Soon you’re no longer finding love but rather chasing it the same way heroin addicts chase the dragon. Just when you’re about to catch the dragon it too slips away (I’ve never tried heroin by the away and don’t ever have any plans of doing so for the readers who take some of these analogies too seriously).

I hate falling in love because of the pain that is attached to those experiences yet I seem to be hooked to the thrill of the chase but aren’t we all addicted to thrill of the chase? Those who have read the blog entry “Who Could Love a Beast or in this Case, An Autistic” will know of my struggles to connect with women and the struggle I’ve had navigating the world of courting women. Let me be blunt, women are far more complicated the than the coding of an operating system or the coding of a robot that can make choices for itself but you don’t need to be Autistic to know that. Machines wish they were as complicated as women. Your life will be so much better when you can admit a simple truth that some of us men have been able to acknowledge for a while, we don’t get women, never have, never will and like campers on the spectrum approaching them with a cookie cutter strategy is a recipe for disaster. I promise I’m not bashing women because lets face it, I’m pretty complicated myself, calculus problems wish they were as complicated as I am. Also there are plenty of complicated men out there so don’t think I’m singling out the ladies.

Connecting with women can be really tricky because my interests and the things I get excited about as well as my lifestyle don’t always play nice with the lifestyle of most women or most people in general. Most people like to go to bars and clubs and get drunk and dance the night away. People like to be around lots and lots of people for long periods of time and just bask in the chaos. My idea of an epic Saturday night most of the time is settling down with a good movie or two or three followed by playing video games that take me to massive world where I slay dragons and defeat evil warlords and wizards or monsters. I’m an introvert at heart, I love people but I hate people. Essentially there is only so much time I can spend around people unless I really really like you. Also I have problems with staying on the phone for long periods of time. It’s not that I don’t like talking to people it’s that it requires a great deal of mental energy for me to stay on the phone and talk to people for as long as people would like for me to talk to them.

My interests which I mentioned above also become an issue because though I acknowledge we’re all different, there are a lot of women who aren’t willing to divulge in my world. You don’t have to like all the nerdy stuff I do but relationships whether they be intimate or strictly platonic go both ways, see if I’m going to endure that really generic chick flick that I can already predict the ending of using sheer logic and the deducing patterns then at some point you need to give some of my nerdy material a chance, you’d be surprised what you might enjoy if you give it a chance. You’d be surprised how much you’d enjoy anything if you gave it a chance. I’m all about trying new things, a concept that we run to the ground at the camp I work at during the summer but a simple concept that will make our lives so much better. I’m willing to embrace the bar/club scene for a woman I like/love as long as she’s willing to endure the geek scene (sci movies, videogames, anime, conventions with droves of people who don’t shower as well as having to walk into clouds of BO, me getting overly excited while watching press conferences where they announce/showoff games I’ve been waiting years for).

Approaching women as also been an issue. I’m always at a loss for words when I see interesting women. I never know what to say or how to strike up a good conversation and most importantly carry one out. I’m terrible at flirting yet somehow I manage to pull it off with out trying. Some days I feel a bit too self conscious for my own good. I know there comes a day where I have to tell her that I’m Autistic and then pray to doesn’t give in to any misconceptions. I’m not to sure if there’s a woman out there who is willing to embrace all of my flaws. I gave online dating a chance at one point but it just didn’t work out. Talking to women on the internet just isn’t for me. I’d much rather know what I’m getting myself into from the get go instead of going by a picture and lines of text not to mention I have of fear of being catfished.

Now you know a little more about some of my dating woes. What does this have with Autism? Once again almost nothing because lets be honest, you don’t have to be Autistic to be a failure with women. I hope you enjoyed another happy tale about my life and got to understand me more as one of the most complex human beings you’ve already met. Look at the bright side though, if you’re me, some of the best video games come out around Valentines Day so while everyone’s bumping uglies with people that they may break up with in few months I get to play games that will bring me happiness for years to come and with time fall in love with them all over again. I promise I’m not strange or hopeless, or negative, I’m just wired to perceive the world differently than others, sometimes in the worse way possible.

P.S.
To the lovely pair across from me at Starbucks, you know you want to kiss each other, I see the way you look at each other so just do the damn thing already and quit beating around the bush.