Approaching a woman in a restaurant required considerably more courage than ordering lunch. My heart was racing by the time I asked whether she was single, which seemed like a reasonable fact to establish before embarrassing myself any further.
She said she was. Better yet, she seemed happy to talk to me. We chatted for a bit, and I got her number. For a brief, pleasant stretch of time, the whole thing was going remarkably well.
I told her I’d text her later. She said she was looking forward to it. An encouraging statement. Fairly difficult to mistake for “Please never contact me,” although I’m apparently still learning the finer points.
A few hours later, I sent a simple message: it was good meeting her, and what were her plans for the rest of the day? Nothing elaborate. I wanted to start a conversation and find out a little more about her beyond the fact that she was single and capable of making me forget how to behave in a restaurant.
That was a couple of days ago. The question about the rest of her day has now expired. The message itself remains unanswered.
I keep coming back to how enthusiastic she seemed in person. Giving me her number was one thing, but saying she looked forward to my text made me think we had both agreed on what would happen next. I would send one. She would receive it. Ideally, there would be a second message, traveling in the opposite direction.
I don’t know what happened between that conversation and now. Maybe something came up. Maybe the interest didn’t last. I have one friendly exchange and one unanswered text, which is a very small amount of evidence to spend this much time reviewing.
So now I’m considering a follow-up, while also wondering whether the silence is enough of an answer. Do I send one more message, or let a promising restaurant conversation remain a promising restaurant conversation?
