One girl sat herself across the classroom from me (we had a U-shaped arrangement) and stared at me all year long.
One girl who was at the same bus station like me every morning asked me once to share a cab with me… for a five-minute ride.
One girl asked me what it feels like for me when I’m kissing.

The third one, even though she was the oldest, seemed insincere and was way out of my league anyway, so I didn’t get the impression that she was after me until much later when a friend clued me in. In the other two cases, I did have an idea, but I wasn’t very much into either of these girls and the second one self-sabotaged her otherwise fantastic move by also inviting two of her friends who kept making a loud mess, so I couldn’t even talk to her during the ride anyway.
And so it took a long time for me to get a real girlfriend. Too high standards, in hindsight, plus I do have no difficulties with talking to girls, but with talking with girls. Turns out the vast majority is just not interested very much in the science-y things I read and did as a tyke, teenager and beyond. Not even in Hegel.