This isn’t very significant, but I wanted to mention it because I find it somewhat memorable. I didn’t even really have a crush on this girl, but it is an instance where she and I seemed to have a bit of chemistry that I wasn’t willing to acknowledge.
Her name was Alicia, and she worked for a certain chiropractor who was a former client of Erin’s. (I’m not certain if he was officially associated with Erin’s startup, but I don’t think he was.) She was the receptionist, quite cute, thin, with cropped blonde hair and blue eyes. I frequently had to work in close contact with her because Erin brought me over there on several occasions to fix or make upgrades to their computer systems, so I was always sitting beside her, telling her what steps to take, or leaning over her to work on her computer myself.
We eventually got to where we talked rather informally. I would even say that it became friendly between us. I never detected any overt expressions of interest in me on her part, but Erin insists they were there. I was thin myself at the time – by no means in shape but definitely more attractive than I am today. I even took care to dress myself presentably and maintain a decent haircut. At that time, I could understand a girl taking interest in me once she talked with me for a little while and recognized my intelligence, conversational ability, and (extremely miniscule) sense of humor. So we would talk about meaningless trivialities – movies, books, the weather – while waiting for some kind of computer installation to finish.
One day she invited me to go with her to Sonic for lunch. (She kept enthusing about how awesome their tater ‘tots are, I remember.) While there, I mentioned that I had been reading Philip K. Dick. (It hadn’t quite tipped me into Insanity yet, but I was fascinated with his ideas regarding Gnosticism and Synchronicity.) She got rather animated and said that her boyfriend was really into Dick as well. We talked about the novels for a little while, but she hadn’t read them herself and didn’t seem very interested in the concepts I was describing. It’s evident to me now that if she dated a man who read Dick, she at least had an interest in men who held things in common with me, but back then I thought nothing of it.
Another day I went in to the office shortly after I had been watching the Punch-Drunk Love “tire iron” scene and repeatedly punching a door frame in my house where I lived with Christian. My right hand was black and blue between two of my fingers and it was obvious I had crunched it against something. Erin seemed quite self-conscious about it because it indicated my instability, and I’m certain Alicia noticed it, but she never said anything. (Later the doc used his 3-D imaging device to show how I had crushed my pinky knuckle.)
That was pretty much it. I was attracted to her. Erin claims she seemed attracted to me. But I just didn’t pursue it, even though it would have been as simple as returning her invite to lunch.