dumb wrote:
The "life circumstances" is 99% likely to be that he is in the friend zone. I would speculate that she had a boyfriend except that they apparently went on a backpacking trip alone together.
Actually it's the fact we currently live 1000+ miles apart, are both extremely personally driven, and have some things we want to accomplish before settling into any serious relationships. No friendzone. We kissed when I left for graduate school and have spoken implicitly about a long-term relationship. We both realize it's not a good time for either of us, so we didn't start anything romantic with one another. We only met in my final year of undergrad too, and we didn't really become "best friends" of sorts until the final months of that time. Despite the distance and time since I left, we still communicate frequently and do not bring up any romantic relationships we're having as we're both aware the other doesn't like to hear about it.
As for ages, I turned 24 in November last year, and she'll turn 22 later this month, so there's about 2.5 years between us. Not a big difference, but I feel like she hasn't thought about life, careers, children, marriage, what she really wants in life, that sort of thing, nearly as much as I have.
As for the intelligence gap, uh, I don't really want to harp on this topic, but the difference is "significant". We hang out, do leisure activities together, and talk about normal life stuff, but we will never connect on a higher intellectual level (which I have been fine with so far; I'm asking if anyone here has had a problem with this in long term relationships).
And finally, of course we should date first. Like I said, this is largely hypothetical. It's not like I'm just going to randomly propose to her one day out of the blue. I am seeing her as a potential wife in the somewhat distant future (probably 4-8 years), at least more so than any other girl I've met, so it's something I think about at times. I'm not dwelling on this at all. I'm just thinking about my life and think, "Hey, if I want to get married, this girl seems like a great candidate, but let's hear some thoughts and advice from other guys on our differences." It wasn't meant to be super serious or heated. I think some of you need to chill out a bit.