I'm female, 50 years old, live in the US and have a serious crush on someone I came across online, he's 34 and lives in another country.
We have never met in person but we connected online over a common interest over a year ago. First I started emailing him about our common interest and he eagerly replied, very friendly, etc. I would comment on and praise his work. I would ask him for his advice on projects I'm working on and he would give me some good feedback. He always replies, even if he doesn't get to it right away.
A couple months ago he started following me on a FB page I manage (so he could get updates on my project more easily). Then he friended me on FB, which of course I accepted. I think maybe he did that to find out more about me out of curiosity.
We share a lot of the same interests, and it is freaky at times. He often makes it a point to tell me (with a winky face ;-) ) that he shares the same interest or thought, etc. He also does consistently punctuate his messages with lots of :-) and ;-). A few weeks ago I recorded a little voice message for him and emailed it, because I'm just not ready to actually talk to him on the phone (and he hasn't talked about calling). I included a little inside joke with it. He replied that 'it was nice to listen to'.
We got talking (messaging) one day and he said he was planning on visiting the U.S. in the future (not sure near or far future) and he said he would stop by and say hi. I told him that would be very cool and was looking forward to it.
I'm having the worst time figuring out if he's shyly flirting with me or not. He is German (I've read that German men are lousy at flirting.). It's hard for me to get a reading on what his intentions are, obviously because it's all online. I could drop an innuendo or two and see how he responds. What do you think?
I'm sort of afraid of it backfiring on me and he ends up thinking I'm just a weird older lady and possibly alienating him. I value his friendship, but can't stop thinking about him obsessively.
I would appreciate any ideas or advice, thank you.