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Girl in class making things awkward, what is going on


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robertdawson

There have only been two class meetings so far so I obviously don't know this girl (therefore it isn't possible to like or dislike her yet) but out of curiosity I would like to know what some people think of how she is acting.

 

The first day of class I went in and without thinking about it sat next to her (I just looked at the people sitting on the row and tried to sit where I had a seat distance from everyone).

The teacher then insisted that everyone find a "partner", so I guess I would have ended up there anyway.

 

After class ended I asked her why the teacher wanted people to find partners, if there was there was some sort of project later on the course (she had taken the professor for the prerequisite). She said no, and I then commented on how I thought it was strange that the teacher insisted that partners exchange emails and phone numbers.

 

Then she responded by saying that I could look her email up in the online class directory and we could study. I felt it was awkward and almost like she had used that as some excuse because she thought I was prying for her contact information. That being said, I sort of, I guess, "corrected" her and said something along the lines of "no, I just thought it was strange that she was insistent on people exchanging information if there wasn't any group work (basically reiterating my first question). Part of my reasoning behind thinking she responded the way she did is because she is very attractive and probably gets asked out a lot. If she was really hinting at wanting to study with me it would be weird because 1) I had known her for about an hour at this time and 2) why did she tell me to look it up in the class directory (it is easy to do but still)?

 

Seeing as how I'm going to be around this person for the next month, I would prefer for it not to be awkward. Did she think I was prying for information or was she being friendly? I seem to not think the latter as she hasn't really initiated conversation with me very often (even though there haven't been that many opportunities I suppose).

 

All she has done is ask me how my second class was when there was a break in the lecture. After class ended though she was trying to book it out of the classroom. I asked her if she did anything interesting while I was sitting in class (sort of a joke I guess) she basically told me her whole afternoon but when I told her what I did that day she just acted weird (all I said was that we had a rec softball tournament). I guess she could have misheard me but regardless, another awkward situation.

 

Why does she keep making everything so awkward?

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Afishwithabike

After conversations number one where you asked her why the teacher wanted the students to pair up, she might have thought you wanted to partner with her. That's a reasonable assumption on her part. That's why she said you could look up her information on the campus directory. She was probably being polite. You then "corrected" her in a way that made it seem you don't want to be her partner. It might have embarrassed her to have you shut down her offer. She's basically said, in so many words, "you can look up my contact information" and you say to her basically "Oh no..that's not what I meant. I was just asking general information about the teacher." If anything I think you might have created the awkward situation, not her. After all by talking to her about the partnering situation, you gave her some room to think you were fishing for a study partner.

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robertdawson

We were partners since the beginning of the class, so me asking her what the teacher meant couldn't have been an invitation to be her partner. When she said I could look her information up on the directory I took it as her thinking I was trying to get her contact information. Since she told me where I could look it up (as opposed to telling me then or writing it down right there) I thought she was uncomfortable and was trying to tactfully defuse the situation.

 

I thought she thought I was asking for her information because a) she is really attractive and probably gets approached often, b) my question could have reasonably been taken that way. What confused me though is a) her mentioning studying after responding in a manner that made me think she was uncomfortable (why would you want to study with someone who made you uncomfortable) and b) even though I'm a guy I personally wouldn't offer to study with anybody I didn't know unless I was attracted to them in some way (whether or not other people follow that logic I don't know). By "correcting" her I was trying to make the situation more comfortable for her.

 

Don't get me wrog, I'm not opposed to studying with her if that is what she wants, but I'm not going out of my way to initiate anything.

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Afishwithabike

I see your point and I see how you could interpret the situation that way. Maybe she took your sitting next to her and chatting with her as interest in her. Who knows. I know at that age I probably would have.:laugh:

 

I'm different from you in that I prefer to study with people I'm not attracted to. I'd find the attraction too distracting.

 

The bottom line is now the girl wants to minimize contact with you for whatever reason so honor that. You don't need to have a discussion about what happened. It's one of those minor weird situations that happens in life. I think you're right in not initiating anything more with her.

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robertdawson

I'm not really sure why this is getting to me so much, especially since this isn't a huge deal, (I guess I just don't like awkward situations) but over analyzing aside...:

 

 

"The bottom line is now the girl wants to minimize contact with you for whatever reason so honor that."

 

I'm not saying you are incorrect, but your statement above seems like a pretty confident one. What parts about what I have said makes you confident that that is the case?

 

 

 

 

Continuing the discussion, don't mind the level of detail (I'm basically just going through my logic and going through the timeline of eventsreiterating my logic again, probably repeating a couple things [helps me focus I guess]): to be honest I'm not completely sure what to think. I'm not particularly adept at interpreting people's actions so that doesn't help. I thought her reaction to the question was strange because if someone had asked me the same question, I would have simply said "no, there

isn't any group work. I don't know why she wanted people to exchange information."

 

But... she offered contact information when it wasn't necessary (see my hypothetical response above) but just told me where to find it (as opposed to giving it to me). If I have a situation where someone needs my contact information for some reason, I usually write it down for them or at least tell them so they can write it down. I suppose there is a small possibility she could have been in a rush/ didn't feel like taking the time to write/tell me so she just did the easiest thing and told me where to find it, but I still think it is strange.

 

The next day I came in, sat down and simply asked her how it was going, nothing special. I didn't say anything else for a while (or really look her way or anything) and then when the professor left the room to get some papers she turned to me and asked how my second class was the day before. I told her about it and said that the professor kept calling this one person out for being on her phone and she said something along the lines of: "oh my goodness! My face would have turned so red, I would have been so embarrassed!" which I thought was a rather exaggerated comment.

 

While we were doing practice problems I made a couple short comments about off-topic stuff (nothing weird or out of the ordinary either) and she responded but in my opinion, rather awkwardly. After class I asked her if she had done anything interesting the day before while I was in my second class (since she had started asking me about things first) and she responded rather enthusiastically with a handful of things that weren't really all that out of the ordinary (for example, she told me about having lunch with one of her girl friends, didn't have an interesting story to go along with it or anything).

 

But when I said what I had done the rest of the day (told her our team had a softball tournament) she acted fairly strange, almost as if she had misheard me and thought I had been talking about some esoteric subject. The only other thing I could think of is she didn't hear me at all and thought I was just standing around waiting to follow her out of the room or something (worst case scenario). I assumed she heard what I said so

I just tried to finish off the conservation by saying that we had to wait another month until softball started again.

 

I don't even remember if she responded after that, and if she did it was probably something as short as "oh". Then she just kept walking out of the room with me and the rest of the class and left. I made sure to pull back and let her get a few feet ahead of me because I definitely didn't want her to think I was following her. At this point I was extremely confused as to how an enthusiastic response in which she gave lots of information she didn't have to give (e.g. she could have said "no, nothing that interesting" instead) let to a super awkward situation.

 

It almost seems as if she is switching between being overly friendly/flirtatious/enthusiastic and being really uncomfortable/nervous from

conversation to conservation... To be quite honest I don't think I've ever encountered a situation like this. What is likely going on? Could there be some other reason I'm unaware of that she keeps acting uncomfortable/nervous for seemingly no reason?

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Afishwithabike

I wasn't there so all I have is what you've posted. You've elaborated more and more in each post with your last post being the most detailed.

 

You've mentioned in your first two posts that you thought she was acting weird and uncomfortable. THAT was why I thought she was trying to avoid contact with you. Seeing as how you were there and you were privy to her facial expressions, body language, tone of voice and all that...I'll let you decide if she was giving you the brush off or not. After all, I'm just a stranger on the internet giving her opinion.

 

You do seem really invested in analyzing this if you don't mind me saying. Perhaps you have more than a slight interest in her...?

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robertdawson

I asked here because I thought I would get someone else's opinion about it.

 

Anyway, to respond to your questions: Honestly, I only have a slight interest in this person at this point, so I'm not really sure why I'm overanalyzing the heck out of this. I've got a one track mind and I guess this is just stuck on my mind since I feel like the situation was odd and it made me uncomfortable.

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There have only been two class meetings so far so I obviously don't know this girl (therefore it isn't possible to like or dislike her yet) but out of curiosity I would like to know what some people think of how she is acting.

 

The first day of class I went in and without thinking about it sat next to her (I just looked at the people sitting on the row and tried to sit where I had a seat distance from everyone).

The teacher then insisted that everyone find a "partner", so I guess I would have ended up there anyway.

 

After class ended I asked her why the teacher wanted people to find partners, if there was there was some sort of project later on the course (she had taken the professor for the prerequisite). She said no, and I then commented on how I thought it was strange that the teacher insisted that partners exchange emails and phone numbers.

 

Then she responded by saying that I could look her email up in the online class directory and we could study. I felt it was awkward and almost like she had used that as some excuse because she thought I was prying for her contact information. That being said, I sort of, I guess, "corrected" her and said something along the lines of "no, I just thought it was strange that she was insistent on people exchanging information if there wasn't any group work (basically reiterating my first question). Part of my reasoning behind thinking she responded the way she did is because she is very attractive and probably gets asked out a lot. If she was really hinting at wanting to study with me it would be weird because 1) I had known her for about an hour at this time and 2) why did she tell me to look it up in the class directory (it is easy to do but still)?

 

Seeing as how I'm going to be around this person for the next month, I would prefer for it not to be awkward. Did she think I was prying for information or was she being friendly? I seem to not think the latter as she hasn't really initiated conversation with me very often (even though there haven't been that many opportunities I suppose).

 

All she has done is ask me how my second class was when there was a break in the lecture. After class ended though she was trying to book it out of the classroom. I asked her if she did anything interesting while I was sitting in class (sort of a joke I guess) she basically told me her whole afternoon but when I told her what I did that day she just acted weird (all I said was that we had a rec softball tournament). I guess she could have misheard me but regardless, another awkward situation.

 

Why does she keep making everything so awkward?

 

Why do you care? Are you interested in her or not? If so, you better get going before another dude steps in and steals her from under your nose. I suggest you throw some attitude at her if you know how to work it. It's a little dodgy, but it often works like a charm if you do it right with the hot girls :cool:. I've gotten enough practice over the years to finally master it.

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Welcome to an academic environent- this is how things work When a prof tells you that yo need to join a group, you have little choice but to turn to the people next to you. That's the point actually.

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robertdawson

"Welcome to an academic environent- this is how things work When a prof tells you that yo need to join a group, you have little choice but to turn to the people next to you. That's the point actually."

 

What's your point? I seem to think this doesn't relate much to this discussion; I am quite aware about how groups work.

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"Welcome to an academic environent- this is how things work When a prof tells you that yo need to join a group, you have little choice but to turn to the people next to you. That's the point actually."

 

What's your point? I seem to think this doesn't relate much to this discussion; I am quite aware about how groups work.

 

I was actually talking about her and the fact that she's acting childish regarding the email exchange and snubbing behaviour.

 

If the two of you are partnered up, you guys need to give one another contact details. The fact that she made it a big deal for you to go out of your way to search for her email address is ridiculous. You have to work together, you don't have a choice, why make it difficult.

 

She's obviously not thrilled about being partnered up with you- but she needs to get used to the fact that in an academic environment, she's not always going to be able to choose her own group. THAT WAS MY POINT.

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robertdawson

D-Lish: Wow, I apologize. I completely misunderstood your comment. For whatever reason I thought you were telling me that I was getting too worked up over the whole thing and that groups/partners aren't that big of a deal. In other words, I thought you were telling me to get over it. I don't know why I care so much about this/why this is bothering me so much, but what the heck, I'm just going to detail the whole deal and be done with it.

If anyone wants to bother reading this wall of text and telling me what they think about it then fine.

 

 

 

There isn't any group work or anything in the class so apparently the teacher just wants people to have partners so that they can compare answers on in class practice problems and keep each other on track (so she doesn't have people getting lost and asking her I guess). Therefore, having a partner in the class is more or less pointless, which is why I asked this girl about it in the first place.

 

Anyway, I agree with you. I thought the way she responded about the email was her being difficult.

 

- What I don't get though is why she would bring up her contact email and mention studying in the first place after she had just told me there was no actual group work for the class.

- Why didn't she just say "yeah, I'm not sure why she was talking about exchanging email addresses, that seems weird" (what I would have said)?

Instead she tells me where I can find her email. Even though it isn't that difficult to get an email from the class webpage come on, all she had to say was her last name, her first two initials and the university domain, 3 seconds max. Given her response I assumed she thought I was trying to work into asking her out or something so I made it clear I wasn't by saying "no, I was thought the professor's request was strange".

 

So obviously, after that I thought she didn't want to have anything to do with me. However, the way she acted the next day only half fit with my assumption. To recap what I said about day two in one of my later posts:

- I merely asked her how it was going when I sat down at the beginning.

- There was basically no conversation for the next hour.

 

- When the professor left to get something I was minding my own business (not looking her way or anything) when this girl initiates conversation with me by asking how my second class was the day before. I told her about it and what had happened to someone in the class and she said something along the lines of: "oh man! My face would have turned red, I would have been so embarrassed!" The conversation lasts a couple minutes.

- through the rest of the class I made two short off-topic comments and she responded indifferently (short responses) as opposed to the "normal" responses and the few energetic ones of the conversation she initiated

 

- Since she had asked me about my class earlier I waited until after class and asked her if she had done anything interesting while I was stuck in it. She then rattled off a short list of things that weren't out of the ordinary at all ("i had a lunch date with one of my girl friends, took a nap: etc. etc.")

- With everyone getting up leaving I didn't really hear the last thing she said so I told her and she repeated the nap bit. I just said "oh" and then told her I had a tournament the day before. At this point she kind of just looked at me. I thought one of two things: she had misheard me and she had thought I had made some off-color/weird remark about her nap or was just standing there waiting for her to leave or something.

- I played it off like she did hear me and just told her my team had to wait another month before our season started again. I don't remember if she said anything or not, but I'm thinking she just responded with "oh".

- After that I pulled way back and let her walk off before I left the room because I definitely didn't want her to think I was following her at this point.

 

I've asked four or five other people about this (male and female) and all the people I asked (when given a similar level of detail as above) conclusively said "it sounds like she's interested in you man, go for it". Since this was the exact opposite of what I thought, I asked them why:

- she told me where to find her email instead of just giving it to me

- why she acted indifferent to my comments after acting interested in the conversation 20 minutes previous

- why she acted so weird after telling me about her day

Everyone's response? They said she was still interested and got self conscious so she dialed back the enthusiasm. I guess they thought that her mentioning studying, acting interested in some conversations and telling me in detail about her day overrode all the signs of disinterest.

 

What do you think about these explanations? So, basically I've got this girl that is uncomfortable (at least part of the time) around me, either because she a) doesn't really want anything to do with me or b) she is interested in me and keeps getting uncomfortable about it. I've got a month left in this class and I've got to share a book with this person so I'd prefer to have some earthly clue as to what is going on so I can try and mitigate the uncomfortableness of this.

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chris_to_pher

I'll spell it out for you. She likes you and guess what --- you like her. The less you show it, the less she shows it. The more you show it, then the more she shows it. Take it from me when I say games don't work. I know.

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Forever Learning
I'll spell it out for you. She likes you and guess what --- you like her. The less you show it, the less she shows it. The more you show it, then the more she shows it. Take it from me when I say games don't work. I know.

 

i agree, games don't work!

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robertdawson

Now she is pretty much neither acting overly enthused or uncomfortable. No conversation initiations from her (no conversation after the class periods end or during class for example), (mostly) normal responses from the very few I've initiated. Pretty much all other conversation is classwork related. The situation seems to have finally leveled off and I think I've figured it out: not explicitly disinterested, but not interested either.

Edited by robertdawson
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