trochee

It's been a few weeks since I've been to the comics store. I went yesterday, about ten minutes before closing, and swept through there like a whirlwind, buying about $50 worth of Good Stuff. Diamond, the Lesser God of Distribution Schedules seems to have decreed this to be a week for me to read about desire and attraction, especially in their relation to (and independence from?) love. Just in time to follow up on my own introspection on the subject of flirtation, romance and sex (not to mention what it means to be a fulfilling partner):

Love and Rockets, Volume 2, #11. Includes a new Xaime story: Maggie has returned to Hoppers, and finally put some of her old ghosts to rest. But Ray, too, has returned. Ray's own monologue forms the cornerpiece of this story, including glimpsing Maggie again and his thoughts and regrets about their former relationship. Both of them are older and wiser than they were; I can sympathize with his moment of regret.
Luba, #8, Gilbert Hernandez' solo work, follows suit with more on the complex human and sexual relationships of this family from Palomar. Definitely more directly interested in the dysfunctional as a source of sex. To me, these stories are deeply tragic -- nearly all these characters are seeking something from sex, yet they can't find it.
Chynna Clugston-Major's Blue Monday: Painted Moon has taken a surprising turn; this usually safe-for-work 90's-high-school-mod-drama comic has suddenly decided to tackle teenage masturbation as a theme; while this could have been abused [heh!] for cheap laughs (a la American Pie) the treatment captures both the embarrassment of (not) talking about this subject with friends and the confusion and delight of discovering your body. No, it's not even approaching the explicitness of Luba, and yet captures the tension and mystique around sexual exploration. The art and storytelling here have a playfulness and joy around them that makes me simultaneously wince for Bleu and Victor's embarrassment and love them both more dearly for it -- the oh, god, I remember being that awkward sense that I got from Napoleon Dynamite.
Finally comes the trade paperback of Mystery Date, another Carla Speed McNeil masterwork, set in the Finder universe (complete with CSMcN's usual helpful footnotes in the back of the trade). Vary is a young woman who is going to school to become a courtesan, for lack of a better word. But this isn't really as dark as it sounds; Vary is a positive, enlightened woman. She has her issues, her complexity, and her drama -- and she's a sex-worker-in-training. As McNeil's footnotes put it:
When Anvardians talk about the arts, they mean any creative endeavor. When they talk about The Art, they mean sex. Specifically, they mean a complicated system of patronage in which rich clan people support artists, writers, dancers and certain types of professional in pursuit of celebrity...
Lian-Jin [Vary's school and home] is one of the Ivy Leagues of The Art. Plenty of Houses aren't this nice, and don't turn out the glossiest of potential Artists. There are franchised Houses like MacFleiss' in which you order off a fluorescent menu bar and all the talent wear identical polyester uniforms. If you want McSex, you can get it.
The main story follows Vary's crush on a professor (a professor of xenology, of course -- they don't just teach sex there, that would be a very poor education). Her crush is unrequited, until they realize that the absence in his life is the absence of someone to call him on his bullshit. Their relationship -- completely without sex -- becomes an important focus and point of stability and happiness in Vary's life (and Dr. Z's, too). It's touching, believable, and familiar, watching this relationship change from one of pursuit and irritation into a comfortable bickering, based on their mutual admiration and respect.