Estimated reading time: 6 minutes
A friend of mine recently posted online that she misses flirting. Technology and the political climate in the US had murdered it, she claimed, and she wasn’t even sure how to flirt anymore. I offered helpful advice: “Just make kissy kissy faces at all the boys. That’s what I do.”
She replied, “Don’t you mean girls?”
“No,” I said. “For the girls I throw rocks at them and pull their hair.”
This is where we are now, folks. We’ve regressed to playground tactics because apparently that was the last time any of us successfully communicated romantic interest without triggering a lawsuit, a security alert, or an existential crisis about heteronormative power dynamics.
Naturally, I turned to the internet for guidance. Because if there’s one thing the internet excels at, it’s reducing complex human behavior into easily digestible bullet points. I found one of those listicles (opens in new tab), you know, those list-based articles that promise to decode the mysteries of human attraction in five convenient steps. I’m hooked on these things, I’ll admit. Partly because they’re like junk food for the brain, but mostly because the word “listicle” sounds like “testicles.”
That’s a lie.
Actually, it isn’t. Testicles!
This particular listicle promised to reveal the “surprising signs someone has a crush on you.” So I read it. And then I compared it to my actual life. What follows is my scientific analysis of why every single one of these supposed crush indicators definitely does NOT apply to me.
Sign #1: They Make Prolonged Eye Contact
The woman at the coffee shop stares at me every morning. Not because she finds me intriguing. It’s because I’m the idiot who orders a “medium dark roast with room for cream” and then stands there blocking the pickup counter while I add seventeen sugars and contemplate whether otters can smell fear.
That’s not attraction in her eyes. That’s the look of someone mentally calculating how many seconds of her life I’ve stolen and whether assault charges are worth it. Her pupils aren’t dilated with desire. They’re dilated with rage. There’s a difference, apparently, though both involve increased heart rate and the possibility of violence.
Eye contact is supposed to be one of the most reliable signs someone has a crush on you (opens in new tab). Except when it’s not.
Sign #2: They Get Nervous Around Me
People do get nervous around me, I’ll give you that. But it’s not romantic tension. It’s the nervousness of someone who just realized they’re trapped in a conversation with a man who has strong opinions about the Oxford comma and won’t shut up about his unpublished novels.
That woman at the grocery store who started stammering when I asked where the quinoa was? Not smitten. She was trying to remember if quinoa was in aisle 7 or 8 while simultaneously planning her escape route. That trembling wasn’t anticipation. It was her fight-or-flight response kicking in when she realized I was about to explain my satirical writing process in excruciating detail.
If you’re looking for real romantic signals, nervousness probably isn’t it. Not in 2026, anyway.
Sign #3: They’re Always in Close Proximity
My wife Karie is always in close proximity to me. Know why? Because we live on the same farm. It’s not romantic positioning. It’s zoning laws and the fact that we share a mortgage.
The UPS driver shows up at my house three times a week. Is he crushing on me? No. Amazon just knows I have a problem with impulse purchases of commemorative spoons from places I’ve never been and DIY taxidermy supplies for projects I’ll never start. Close proximity in 2026 doesn’t mean someone’s interested in you. It means you both need coffee, or you both work in the same building, or you both made the poor life choice of living somewhere with affordable real estate.
Physical proximity might show up on every list of flirting signs (opens in new tab), but it’s basically meaningless now.
Sign #4: They Get Dressed Up Around Me
Nobody gets dressed up around me. If anything, people get dressed DOWN around me. I work from home on a farm. My professional attire is “whatever doesn’t have pig snot on it.” When someone shows up to meet me wearing actual pants with a zipper, they’re not trying to impress me. They’re just demonstrating basic social competence.
That woman I met for coffee to discuss editing work showed up in a nice blouse and jewelry. Was she dressing up for me? Absolutely not. She was dressing like a normal human being who occasionally leaves the house. I was dressed like a Creative Writing professor on sabbatical who’s given up on society. The contrast wasn’t sexual tension. It was a visual representation of my life choices.
Sign #5: They Laugh at My Jokes
People laugh when I talk. I’m aware of this. But here’s the thing: they’re not laughing because they’re charmed. They’re laughing because what I just said was either genuinely absurd or made them deeply uncomfortable and laughter is their only defense mechanism.
When I told my dental hygienist about my novel featuring government-enhanced otters, she laughed. Hard. Was she flirting? No. She was processing the fact that a grown man who writes about conspiracy theory janitors and weaponized river mammals was currently in her chair with his mouth wide open, completely vulnerable. That laugh was nervous energy, not romantic interest.
The barista giggles when I order my unnecessarily complicated coffee drink. Not because she likes me. She finds me amusing because I’m the weirdo who says “medium dark roast” instead of “grande” like a normal person, and she finds my refusal to learn Starbucks vocabulary either endearing or pathetic. I’m not sure which, but neither one results in a date.
According to every article about attraction signals (opens in new tab) I’ve ever read, laughter is supposed to be one of the most reliable signs someone has a crush on you. Turns out, it’s not.
The Conclusion
So what does all this mean? It means nobody’s flirting with me. Not a single person. All those supposedly “surprising signs someone has a crush on you” in that listicle are just normal human behavior misinterpreted by someone with the self-awareness of a golden retriever and the romantic prospects of a middle-aged man who spends his days reading articles about human attraction while surrounded by farm animals.
The only solution, the only way I’ll ever know if someone actually likes me, is if they throw rocks, pull my hair, or make kissy faces. At least those signals are unambiguous.
Until then, I’ll just keep assuming everyone’s being polite and nobody’s interested.
It’s safer that way.
Key Takeaways
- The author humorously reflects on the decline of flirting due to modern communication barriers.
- She critiques common signs of attraction, arguing they often misrepresent genuine interest.
- Instead of romantic signals, she interprets behaviors like eye contact and nervousness as misunderstandings.
- Ultimately, the author concludes that clear, old-fashioned gestures are necessary for genuine flirting.
- She embraces the notion that interpreting interest in today’s world requires a more straightforward approach.
Related Links
See my Amazon author page.
His first manuscript was composed entirely of punctuation marks and confused sketches. He's since published "Not Bukowski" (poems that don't rhyme) and "Slop and Swell from a Festering Mind" (essays so concerning that bookstores check on his wellbeing). He once spent three hours photographing a rare bird that turned out to be a plastic bag, and he's the only person banned from church bake sales for "weaponized brownies." Inheriting absurdism from Vonnegut and Adams, sprawling narratives from Irving, and weaponized failure from Moore, he writes about conflicted everymen struggling through supernatural chaos. He remains unconvinced that birds aren't surveillance drones.
More biographic lies...err...info.
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