coffee & chat, or more than that?

Q: I received an email from a guy (an acquaintance) I knew from college. It's been 1 1/2 years since I last talked to him, & he now lives several states away. He was going to be passing through my town, and he asked if we could get together to catch up. I've always thought he was a nice guy, so I said yes. We met for coffee & talked for about 4 hours. I was left confused & somewhat interested in him. He's emailed me a few times since then, but that's all. What does all of this mean? Is he interested, or does he only see me as a friend?

A: Interested. You said only acquaintances in school. That's pretty telling. I've got acquaintances from school (and I spent some time in school). If they were guys I was getting back in touch with, no big deal. If they were girls, and pay attention to this part: if I wasn't already hanging out with them when I was in school, then yeah; "getting together to catch up" = interested. (Notice the period there, ending the paragraph, and the discussion. I'm that certain.)

Why the sporadic contact since then? Let it be a mystery no more. This fella no longer lives around here, right? You remember when your buddy the Guyru of Dating gave the advice to take a relationship offline if you want it to go anywhere? Same thing. If you were only acquaintances, then you had one "date" and he was back out of town again...well, how many good email conversations can you swap and call it a relationship? I know, it can happen and there's always exceptions. But, this sounds like an open & shut case. Interested, but unavailable, even if only because of distance. Maybe he was just testing the waters, taking a safe risk or playing what-if. I'm going to leave it at that.

When guys you were only "acquaintances" with back in the day suddenly reappear and want to "catch up", ask yourself this, ladies: "catch up on what? We were just acquaintances!" Of course he's at least a little interested! What he wants is to pick up where he left off. (One important exception: if he's since become a traveling salesman, this could be a deciding factor. If the conversation goes toward your insurance coverage, investment portfolio, tupperware, etc. then he's interested...in your money!) To tell you the truth, the Guyru of Dating is thinking women enjoy being confused about these things! (I think we do like to "make" things more complicated than they really are!)