I met a lady through an online dating site.
We talked for roughly three months before we met, mostly about movies and books.
We went to an art museum for our first date.
She was awesome! And she appeared to be enjoying herself.
I on the other hand didn't quite feel like myself. I was nervous.
After the museum I asked her if she would like to get a drink or perhaps something to eat or if she would rather go home. She elected to get something to drink.
When the date ended she hugged me and said "lets please keep in touch."

I sent her a text the very next morning on Superbowl Sunday. I thought she might like to come with me to a party. Later that night, I called her from the party to ask her to the after party because there were going to be one or two pro athletes there whom I thought she'd like to meet.
nothing..
The next day I called and then sent an email asking if everything is okay.
A day later she sent me this:

I had fun at the museum and Cafe with you on Saturday, but I can't honestly say I felt the connection I need to move things beyond a friendship between the two of us. I would like to keep in touch and hope you feel the same. Let me know the next time you attend the Cathedral maybe I'll see you there.

This kind of crushed me because it seemed like we were connecting.

I actually ran into her a few days ago. When she saw me she lit up and she seemed genuinely happy to see me. It felt like our attraction was in sync. I just don't get the email she sent. I don't think 35 year old women play games and she seems too intelligent and mature to be the type.

So my question is, how should I proceed. I'm already going to go on a date with someone else this weekend, but should I wait a few weeks or months and try her again? Should I just forget about her when I don't really want to? I don't want to chase her, but is there a way to get her interested again without coming of a needy guy?

I am in a similar situation. What keeps me going is that I genuinely love her, and the love in my heart makes me happy enough to overcome the sadness that she doesn't love me back. When I feel the love for her that I do feel, I feel warm all over my body. Besides, I know after decades of living - I am now 68 years old - that once I start to love a woman, I never stop loving her. This has happened to me a dozen or so times in my life. (I am a widower: my wife of 25 years, Claire, passed on rather suddenly about seven months ago, and I was devastated.)

So I told Sonja, my new woman friend whom I met through an on-line dating service, that I am not going to stop loving her, but am going to continue to love her all the time: and that, utterly unconditionally - that is, whether she loves me back or not. We meet regularly a couple of times a week, just to spend time together: and we do have wonderful times together, both when it's just the two of us or when she comes and visits my family and, sometimes, also friends, mostly for dinner. We get together like this quite regularly. She does give me a hug and a kiss every time we meet, and also every time we part: something I look forward to during every single visit. Every time we meet I feel wonderful: indeed I feel wonderful just to look at her. Even when I just gaze at her I feel as if I am having sex with her and making love to her. When she is not with me, especially when I am in bed at night, I imagine myself with her, touching her all over her body, kissing her genitals, lying with my head on her crotch, and generally making love to her and pleasuring her and giving her orgasms and engaging in afterplay with her: and even that, by itself, makes me very, very happy. Sonja is 54 and was never married. I don't - yet - know why she does not reciprocate, even though I satisfy all the characteristics she says she looks for in an ideal man: compassionate, passionate, handy around the house, great sense of humour, and a few other things like that (unfortunately I've forgotten some of the characteristics she mentioned, but I do remember that when she mentioned them, I felt like I was fitting the bill perfectly). We are both financially independent, so it can't be a problem having to do with money. If anything, I have a bit more money than she has, though I am also supporting three dependent children (however, two of them will soon become independent, as they are finishing university). Perhaps she has some problems about opening up to sex: whenever I bring up the subject of sex between the two of us, she changes the subject, and has told me that she feels pressured by me when I do this repeatedly. She has, however, also told me recently that she is willing to discuss sex as a GENERAL subject, as long as the discussion doesn't turn to a conversation about sex BETWEEN the two of us. I am going to try this avenue to find out why she feels so uncomfortable about sex between the two of us. But what I want most between the two of us is not sex: it is LOVE, and I for one am not going to stop loving Sonja regardless of what she does. If she doesn't love me back it will hurt, but I am quite sure that it won't hurt enough to overcome the joy and warmth flooding through my body that I get from LOVING her.

Once I decided that the happiness that comes from loving Sonja is, and will always be, greater than the pain of unrequited love, I decided to go for loving her regardless of being loved by her. My late wife, Claire, was the most loving person I have ever known, and I decided when she passed on to learn from her example and to incorporate her great love into my own being. Claire loved me unconditionally, and never stopped loving me till the day she died. There no such thing as a finite amount of love: a person can love as much as people might think possible, and still have love left over for more. And to love someone, one doesn't actually HAVE to be physically with that person. In fact, some of the greatest sex I ever had was with Claire a few weeks after she passed on, when she came to me in my thoughts while I was sitting on a park bench, and started kissing me all over my body and talking to me and making love to me. It was a total revelation to me, that sex could be so much in the mind that I did not have to be actually touched, or even to touch myself, to have some of the greatest sex possible to be experienced (and during my live I have experienced some really, really great sex). I wasn't doing anything to make this happen at that time, mind you: it all took place spontaneously. Claire is in my heart all the time, even though her body has been cremated and the ashes are sitting in an urn in my living room.

So I learned from this experience, and decided to realise the presence of Sonja in my heart also: and lo and behold, I find that she is. I learned yesterday, from a web site called yabyummy.com, that when we love someone, they actually come to LIVE in the limbic system in our brains: and so must it have happened with me and Sonja. Though she is, in one sense, away from me, in another sense she can never be separated from me. I have known Sonja for about four months - five if you count the time we were just corresponding on-line - and during this time she has come to live WITHIN me. Yes, it hurts, and hurts a lot, to know that she doesn't feel as strongly attracted to me as I do to her, but it would hurt much, much more were I to stop loving her. I have tried dating others, but not successfully: I think of Sonja during my dates with others. The wonder and magic of love is not ONLY about being loved (though I have experienced this wonder too, especially with Claire): to is also the wonderful and magical feeling that one gets by simply LOVING someone, whether the love is returned or not.

I am always reluctant to give advice, because what works for me may not work for others: but I will say that this has worked for me. And one more thing: what also works is my willingness to communicate all my feelings and desires and experiences to Sonja. I feel hopeful that some day she will reciprocate - she has said to me that she doesn't know whether she will or not, which leaves the possibility open - but even if she never does, I shall always feel it a great joy and privilege to have been given the opportunity to LOVE her with all my heart.