There's definitely some point in life where things are in a gray area because of who you are exposed to and how often you're exposed to them. That the conditions of life from the day to day may lead to something that puts a strangeness about what to do and if there is even a plan of action or if it should all be stopped before it gets out of hand, or rather, less out of hand than it already has become.
There's also the bit of ideally not dating anyone from the workplace because it could lead to complications or unnecessary tensions as a result. But then one is to wonder, well where shall I go to find connections and relationships if all I ever do is go to work and otherwise stay at home or go to the gym plugged up with earbuds so as to not really ever interact with anyone. Sure, I take online classes but I seldom and pretty much never interact with any of my classmates as it is all online and the most I've interacted is a mandatory speech web meeting and a group chat for a different class that is seldom ever used.
In technicality, sure I could resort to dating apps and try to find something there, but for some reason I just don't feel super comfortable with it and while I do technically have some apps downloaded and the accounts created, I just never use it because it just isn't exactly something I want to use. I guess it could be a contingency plan so to speak that if push comes to shove and somehow that's the only way I'll find someone, then I guess we can try it, but it's definitely a very back burner idea.
The problem that I face is the intricacies of certain..... obstacles that only time can control. That's the best way I can put it because otherwise I sound like a creep. And there it is, I guess I just incriminated myself anyways. While I guess one could theoretically argue that it's not really in one's control to whom one is attracted to or interested to get to know more, there still is the conscious decision to act. And acting on it now is definitely going to be frowned upon just because of age.
Sometimes, I don't feel like I am my age, but then I have to remind myself that I am that age and that just because I don't feel like it doesn't mean that it isn't true. That I just cannot pretend that I am the younger age I feel like. And sometimes even while thinking to myself that nothing has really changed in my mind from when I was 17, the fact of the matter is that 4.5 years have passed and I'm well on my way to being 22. And that's where the issue is.
There is a part of me that tries to justify the whole rule of thumb as far as acceptable dating ages, which is the "half your age plus 7." So that would mean that at 21, it would technically be acceptable to date someone no younger than 17 and a half. But that is just an issue still because I am not a minor and 17 and a half is still 6 months left of being a minor. I suppose at this point I could just definitely wait until I am 22, and then the "rule of thumb" (quotations because there's no law or legality behind it, it's just some saying that most people have accepted as commonplace) would set it so that I could date as young as 18 but no younger than that. And at that point, there is not really any legal issues with that.
However, even if I were to, there's still the mental differences from an 18 year old to a 22 year old. And that's when things could still become sticky (and this is ignoring the part of interacting with a coworker and all...). Part of me tries to justify that my aunt on my mom's side dated and married someone who is 4 years older than her (as I'm pretty sure my uncle was a senior in the same college as my aunt when she was a freshman). So yes, technically it could work. And maybe it's not so weird as long as a friendship was built first and if there is even something to work with there.
Now this is getting towards borderline scheming again, and as we know that schemers never win. But I guess at the same time, it seems like there's at least grounds for a friendship if nothing else at all happens. I guess at this point I might as well add something about her because it's not like it's really a secret anymore about the subject given how much I elaborated in the previous paragraphs.
This coworker is nice, she seems to have some solid goals in mind and is accepting of people in different stages of life. There is common ground as far as faith/religion is concerned, and there are some connections such as Liberty University as I have a car magnet to represent the time I was there and she having an older brother who just graduated from the nursing program there. Now the one thing I'm not going to do is make any comments about her physical appearance as that is definitely a no-go zone at least for now. Or at least I'd think so anyways. I mean I guess technically I could just mention it and that's that, but let's not test those waters. The point is she is a nice girl whom I'd like to get to know more but with the age difference alone and then the added bit of we work together, it puts a decent obstacle in the way of telling myself to not act.
I guess all that I can do is that if I call myself a man of faith then I should go before the Lord and pray about it. Pray that if it is not meant to be that these whatever you call them, feelings if you will, are taken away so that I may make room for what is important in my life. And then I guess it could just be asking that if it is meant to be that the Lord make the way for it all when the timing is right. And then there's nothing more for me to do except to be still and wait.
One final note is that I wonder if I'm being obvious and if she caught on already. Because in the past I've been known to never be subtle about these sorts of things, and given that today when work quieted down and other coworkers were taking their breaks, I basically had the greater part of 30 minutes of just talking to her and learning more about who she is outside of the workplace. Stuff of what she does for fun, minor stuff asking about her family and all, etc. just small talk to learn her as a person. I mean maybe I'm overthinking it as per usual, but I don't think a guy just casually tries to learn more about a girl, right? Or maybe that is a possibility for purely platonic sake. All I know is that most of the questions I asked, she returned after answering, so I guess if nothing else there is a friendship of some kind.
That's all I've got for now, and I guess I should honestly go pray about it and see what comes of it from there on out.
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