Subjugation to the Weak

I was once loosely entangled with a woman I knew. By “loosely entangled,” I mean there were other women for me and other men for her. This was not a story where sexual encounters meant commitment. Commitment meant commitment, which, I suppose, is the point of the story.

She came to me one day to complain that some men in her life had conspired against her to ruin her reputation, with the result that she lost her job and couldn’t find another in her field. While I didn’t tell her so, I had already heard that story from one of the men I knew fairly well. I also didn’t mention that I was becoming suspicious of why she wanted me to take her to dinner if this was what we were going to talk about.

“I need somebody to take a chance on me.” She said.

“Ahh, there it is,” I said to myself. I could feel it coming.

My dilemma was that while I did like her, and I did think she was smart and talented, I didn’t want to commit myself to anything because I was pretty suspicious of what she was up to.

“What if you come to work for me—part-time?” I said. “Just until you can prove yourself and this bad reputation thing blows over, and you can continue your career somewhere else.”

That seemed fair to me. More than fair. She needed someone to take a chance on her, I needed somebody who didn’t question why I would be romantic with her but not help her out when she was in a bind.

It was, of course, a trap. Part-time soon became full-time. Full-time soon became salaried with stock options. Meanwhile, the “prove yourself” part of the job just wasn’t happening.

Eventually, I said, “This has got to end.” That made her pretty mad.

What she didn’t realize was that I saved the letter to her where I said, “I’ll look like a genius if you’re successful in your job, but I’ll look like an idiot if you’re not.” I also saved the letters where I was begging her to “please, please meet the job-related goals we set together.”

I also wrote pretty extensive letters about how this all began because I had personal feelings for her, which made me feel obligated to give her a chance, but that she was making me really regret ever feeling that way because she was becoming more and more of a burden every time I saw her. “Regardless of all that, this will all be worthwhile if you start being profitable in your position.” I wrote. But that never happened.

I also saved letters from two of the men involved in ruining her reputation about why they did it. That put me in a position of having to try to convince them that she wasn’t actually an evil person, even though I was really beginning to have my own suspicions.

None of this would have happened if I had left Mississippi like I was planning. None of this would have happened if a woman’s tears didn’t have such a ridiculous impact on me.

I’ve always been aware that most women can cry at will. I’ve had them demonstrate it to me and laugh about how they use it to get out of traffic tickets. What always trapped me was the idea that if I liked somebody, then I shouldn’t doubt them and secretly believe they would manipulate me, even though it happened over and over and over.

I still believe, and I will always believe, that the strong should always subjugate themselves to the weak—even though that means they will, fairly often, be taken advantage of. It’s part of the deal. Being in a strong position doesn’t mean you’re in a better position.