Not being involved romantically with anyone in New York City in the Spring when I was working at Travelers Aid-ISS in the mid-1970's, I decided to try to find a possible female companion by replying to a "wishing to meet" personal ad that appeared in some kind of poetry magazine newspaper, in which a poetess expressed an interest in exchanging poems and corresponding with a poet; and possibly developing some kind of friendship.
And, after she mailed me some of her poems and I mailed her some of my poems, we then each mailed a photo of ourselves to each other.
From the photos we mailed each other, we both seemed to feel that, besides liking each other's poetry, we might be two people in their 20's who would find each both emotionally and physically attracted to each other, if we met each other in person.
So, by an exchange of letters, it was arranged that one Saturday in the Spring I would take a train up to New Haven and walk from there to where the poetess then lived in Hamden, Connecticut; where we could then hang out together for an afternoon in-person. And so I took a train up to New Haven one Saturday in the Spring, during the period when I was working at Travelers Aid-International Social Services.
But after I got off the train at the New Haven railroad station, walked north through New Haven, then past a shopping mall in Hamden and finally reached the culturally-straight-looking middle-class private home at the the address where the young poetess had indicated she lived at and rang the bell, it was answered by the older sister-in-law of the poetess.
And after the sister-in-law, a white culturally-hip-looking woman in her late 20's who talked as if she had attended college before marrying, had gone upstairs to tell the younger white poetess that her expected visitor had arrived, the sister-in-law and the poetess's white father (who looked to be in his late 50's and apparently also lived in the same house) came downstairs to the first floor living room to apparently "look me over" more carefully.
And then, during the few minutes while we were all waiting for the poetess I had been corresponding with to come downstairs, the poetess's sister-in-law indicated to me that she--not the poetess--had actually been the person who placed the ad in the poetry magazine newspaper for her sister-in-law, that I had responded to initially.
Although, after the white poetess I had been corresponding with, herself, cam downstairs to greet me still looked physically attractive to me, the photograph of herself which she had previously mailed to me, unlike the photograph of myself I had sent her, seemed to have been one that was taken a few years before. Because in the photograph of herself she had sent me, the poetess had looked a few years younger than she now looked; and now she was somewhat heavier in weight than she had been a few years earlier.
Seeing me in-person, however, the white poetess in her early 20's still seemed friendly; although my impression was that her sister-in-law (who had apparently been hoping that placing the classified personal ad for the poetess in the poetry magazine might help the poetess find some compatible male companion who might enable the poetess to move out of the family house) quickly realized that, having not driven up in a car and not being an owner of a car, I was unlikely to turn out to be the male companion that she was hoping to find for the poetess, whom she hoped to see move out of the family's house soon.
But only moments after coming downstairs, the poetess suggested I follow her outside to the car which she apparently owned; and that we both then visit a friend of hers, whom she also wanted me to meet.
So many decades later, I can't now recall much of what we talked about in the car as she drove to a local park, where she had apparently previously arranged to meet her friend; in order to let her friend, who turned out to be a Black woman in her early 20's, whom most men would then have not considered particularly attractive, help the poetess determine whether I was a man who was worth getting involved with.
But what I do recall concluding in the car, as she drove and we talked, was that, although I had been impressed by the poetry she wrote, because it seemed to reflect, lyrically, the sense of emotional loneliness and emotional emptiness I then felt about living within mid-1970's U.S. society, however desperate both she and her sister-in-law might be to find some male companion for her to help her escape from the family's private home in which she felt then trapped, I was not someone who could offer her a better daily life situation.
There would be little likelihood that the slum apartment in Brooklyn's Red Hook section and much more economically impoverished situation that I could then only offer her if she became involved with me would provide a more satisfying or happier lifestyle alternative for her than what her then-current lifestyle situation in Hamden, Ct. provided her with--especially because, despite being also antiwar and anti-racist, 1970's New Left Movement politics or 1960's New Left Movement history was of little interest to her.
After the poetess and I arrived at the local park where the poetess's Black woman friend was waiting inside her own different car, the two women friends and I both left the cars and walked inside one of the lean-to-type structures in the park. And inside the lean-to-type structure in the park alone with the two young women, I didn't get any particular sense that, at that time at least, they were interested in inviting me to have some kind of immediate sexual-type encounter with them in the lean-to-type structure.
But after we conversed for a few minutes in the lean-to-type structure in the park and the poetess's Black woman friend looked me over, the poetess's woman friend then asked me to let the poetess know of any guys I knew in New York City who might want to get involved with her.
Turned off both by the realization that the poetess had both mailed me an old photograph of herself from a few years before, rather than a photograph indicating how she currently looked, and that she had seemed more interested in showing me off to her woman friend when I visited her, than in spending the time together alone with me to see whether or not here was an actual basis for us to develop some kind of love relationship, I caught the next scheduled train from New Haven back to New York City, as quickly as I could.
Following my visit to Hamden, CT, the poetess wrote to me and expressed some disappointment that, after we had met in-person, I no longer seemed interested in exchanging poems with her or writing any letters to her.
But having concluded that, aside from then being an unattached, available man for a young woman who was looking for some kind of a boyfriend, I really couldn't offer her enough in the way of either common interests or economic security to really satisfy whatever eventual escape from her current unhappy living situation she was then looking for, I did not reply to the poetess from Hamden, CT's last letter to me.
In retrospect, perhaps I should have then invited her to visit me in Brooklyn and seen if she was open to becoming sexually involved with me, despite neither of us then feeling any particular romantic love for each other, after meeting in person in Hamden?
Yet once she saw my slum apartment, realized how economically impoverished I then was and found that I couldn't even then afford to have a telephone connection installed in my apartment and just relied on public telephone booths, when I needed to make a phone call, I think it's doubtful that she would then have been interested in developing a sexual relationship with me; and would then have likely been just eager to rush back to Hamden, CT from my slum apartment in Brooklyn, as quickly as she could.
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