Josh Anastasia

I’m a fairly intelligent person; alright, I think I’m damn intelligent, but that’s just my ego talking here. I’ll pretend I’m modest and say that I’m fairly intelligent, leaving room for error. I understand a lot of things, things come easily to me, I read or hear something and I remember it; I read physics books for fun for crying out loud. However, there is one subject/topic that I will never, ever, understand. This being girls.

Looking at a situation from the outside, I can easily analyze it, tell what’s happening, and predict with a fair amount of certainty what the outcome will be. When I’m in the situation, I have absolutely no clue as to what is going on. Someone could be flirting with me, I would not know it. Unless they came right out and said, I am flirting with you. I think the only exception is Mandy because we’ve known each other for so long. That, and it’s blatantly obvious most times. Not that I flirt with Mandy…

I talk a lot with girls. Girls at work, girls online. Most of my friends are girls so I am no stranger to them. I just can’t for the life of me figure out when a girl is flirting with me. And if they are flirting with me, is it genuine or just part of their personality? By nature, I am a flirtatious person. Sometimes I say things that could be considered flirtatious, but mostly I’m just being nice and telling the truth. Like complimenting a girl on how beautiful they are. I tend to give a lot of compliments to girls, whether I’m interested in them or not.

How I Flirt

I wouldn’t say that I’m good at flirting. Sometimes I flirt and I don’t even realize it. Other times, I lay on the charm on purpose. A lot of times, I come across as an idiot; a socially inept idiot. I am pretty socially inept though. I’m a geek, I’m just now starting to come out of my shell. I haven’t had much experience in social situations and if I have been in social situations, more often than not, I am quiet as hell. So, it isn’t a stretch to say that I go blank when I’m around girls. Seriously, when I talk to girls, unless they are strictly friends, my brain just shuts off and something else takes over. I don’t know what else takes over, but it’s certainly not my brain in charge.

So, my brain is mush. It is useless. Thankfully, I log all of my IM conversations, so I can go back and read how much of an idiot I’ve been.

If you answer yes to any of these questions, I have probably flirted with you.

1. Have I listed off weird facts, tid bits, or bits of knowledge? Either this has happened randomly or it’s fit into the conversation somehow. If I’m not flirting with you, I will either say “nice” or just laugh (”haha” if we are online).
2. Do I compliment you excessively? Excessively, in my world, would be at least once every conversation. The only exception is Lisa. She is my BIFF (Bestest Internet Friend Forever) and we have reached the “friend zone”. I don’t think we were ever not in that zone. There are very few girls that I talk with that have reached my “friend zone” so it’s more than likely I either want to date you or get in your pants or both.
3. Do I sound like an idiot? This is self-explanatory. If I sound like an idiot, I am flirting.
4. Do I talk about making out or boobs? This might not seem like flirting to most girls, but if I happen to mention that I want to make out, I more than likely mean “I want to make out…with you.” If I happen to mention boobs, well, I don’t specifically mean your boobs, but if I’m thinking about boobs, then I am probably flirting with you…that’s just how I roll.

The Story

I think Lisa will be happy to read this, since she seems to like to talk about this topic. As she said to me last night, it’s nice to talk about my issues instead of hers. There is a story to this, and it begins now.

About a month ago, I put up an ad on craigslist looking for friends. I never mentioned that I’m awesome or that my nickname is joshawesome. So when I received a reply from a girl, whom I will call Amanda because that is her name, and she stated that she was awesome, of course I was like roflcopter and had to get to know her. Well, I did get to know her a little bit and I quickly developed an internet crush on her. In my close circle of friends, mostly Lisa, she became known as the internet crush girl.

Thinking that it wouldn’t go anywhere, I decided to tell the girl that I had an internet crush on her. Now, after this happened, I became obsessed with analyzing things that she said to try to figure out if she sort of liked me or if she thought I was the biggest geek and laughed at me. Of course, as I’ve said, I cannot read girls for the life of me, so Lisa became my interpreter. I would go to her often and be like “zomg! what does this mean????” and she would often say “It’s hard to say”. Well, thank you! Because that doesn’t help me!

I was about to give up and say screw it, who cares if she likes me back. That was, until yesterday when I was drunk and decided to text her. Drunk texting is not something I recommend doing but sometimes it works. Well, I don’t really remember how I came about asking her, but eventually I asked her if she liked me. She said she did. Now I was drunk when I had this reaction, but I probably would have had the same reaction when I was sober, but I was like “zomg! really!? because that is awesome! super awesome even!” and no I did not say that to her. But in my head, that’s what I was thinking. I tried to play it cool; I’m not really sure how that turned out…

Forward to last night when I did something that I normally don’t do…ok, haven’t ever done. Who do I turn to for advice? Lisa, of course, who I go to for all my girl-related situations. I don’t know what any of it meant, means, or what to do about it and if Lisa were around, she would know exactly what I should do. But Lisa isn’t at the moment so I’m stuck being an idiot asking Amanda if she would be brave enough to eat a bagel that I made from scratch.

It’s easy to have a crush on someone. For the most part, when I have a crush, I don’t expect things to happen. I mean, it’s a crush. It’s obvious that I like this girl and that she’s not really a crush anymore. But now this has caused me to freak out a bit. Maybe more than a bit. I broke up with the girl I was dating because I didn’t have a lot of time, I’m not emotionally ready to handle anything more than a crush, and I just really don’t want to date. But is that really it? I think I’m making up these excuses so that I won’t get close enough to anyone to get hurt, or to have to worry about someone else’s feelings in my fucked up life. I know exactly what’s holding me back and why I’m so afraid to let anyone in on this sort of emotional level.

I can have friends, close friends even, but to allow the possibility for more than friendship freaks me out. Should I be so freaked out by this stuff? No, I probably shouldn’t. I’m being selfish and stupid about it. And I’m not saying that anything will happen with Amanda, because I really don’t know if it will and I’m not expecting anything. Would I like something to happen? I don’t know, but I’m not opposed to it. But would I be able to let something happen? Part of me is saying “Josh, WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!?!?” and the other part of me is saying “JOSH! GO FOR IT!”.

Is the fact that I’m worrying about this shit a sign? A sign that I’m doomed? I don’t know. I have a tendency to over-analyze everything. It’s not necessarily a good thing. In fact, in most cases, it’s a bad thing. I mean, shit, I just found out this girl “likes” me and I’m already worried about what could happen next. If there even is a next. I have a habit of ruining things so who really knows…

Sometimes I really do just need to shut the fuck up.