"So, there's this woman around my age that I see around church. She's always friendly and in our brief conversations, it seems like we have some things in common. Can I ask her to go for coffee with me, or I seem creepy?"
If you read the above sentence with no context, you'd think it was a guy hoping to go out on a date with this lady, right? Except it's not. It's about me. And no, I'm not trying to get myself a girlfriend! The hard truth is that after a year living here, I'm still finding it hard to make friends. Now that I work at our church, there are a lot more people that I'm friendly with, and colleagues that I like talking to, but no one who I could call out of the blue or with whom I hang out outside of the church. I didn't even realize this until a friend of mine was in town last weekend and said she wished she could attend our church with us to meet my friends. My first reaction was, "Oh, I don't have friends." And then I realized that was true.
In my "old life" in Ottawa, it seemed like I didn't have to put in a lot of effort to make friends. I was involved with several ministries and served on missions trips, so I just naturally met people and got close to them. Here in Toronto, however, I try to stay home in the evening to have time with my husband, and that's meant that my main interaction is with the retired crowd at prayer meeting. They are lovely and inspiring ladies, but I crave friendships with people closer to my age too.
I'm coming to realize that it's time for me to be a little more active in forming friendships. Those "let's all go for wings after fellowship" nights are probably less likely to happen now that people my age have spouses and kids (and, speaking for myself, lower energy levels), but that just means I may have to go a little out of my comfort zone to make friends.
So that brings me to my first question: Is it creepy to ask this woman out to coffee?? Any suggestions or advice?
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