Girl Without a Past

So here, in a nutshell, is my romantic history thus far.
(My face feels flushed just thinking about it.)

I crushed on maybe a dozen boys in high school but I thought if you liked someone you should dream about them all the time and never ever tell them.  You didn't even have to talk to them.  You just admired from afar.  (Although in grade eight I did manage to finagle my way into sharing a locker with my crush.) 
I don't know if I wasn't ready to date but romance stayed in the realm of fantasy for me and I didn't seem worried about it. 
After high school I went straight to art school and it was such a different world for me that for four years I was caught up in this creative whirlwhind and all other areas of my life were ignored.  I didn't even think about romance, didn't 'like' anybody until the summer before fourth year.  I had a summer job and a guy I had liked in high school took the same bus as me in the mornings.  We went to lunch once and I didn't have any money.  We hung out a little bit, went to a special film screening and he met all my art school friends.  I expressed some disapproval at someone smoking pot before the show and he was surprised.  After that I think I phoned him twice and he didn't return my call.
Then there was another long spell where I was busy trying to get started as an artist and I really had other things on my mind.  At that point being single was how I was used to existing. 
When I was twenty-five I started to freak out a bit.  It's going to take another post or two to explain all the drama that was going on at that time, but the short version is that I quit everything that I was doing and took a crappy retail job while I figured stuff out. 
A guy at work starting joking around with me and I found myself keeping an eye out for him.  He asked me if I'd seen this obscure movie, which wasn't one I thought I'd like, but I agreed to go to his house and watch it with him and his friends....then later it turned out that wasn't the plan at all and we went to dinner.  He just seemed to think I was great and I felt so good, one of the best feelings of my life.  "I like you" were maybe not the three little words most people dream of hearing but I was over the moon.  I was skitttish though, and at the end of the date I hugged him and skidaddled.  Later I felt bad and invited him to this art opening I was involved in.  The more he talked, the more doubt I felt.  He smoked, he was nine years older than me, he was reading some book about aliens building the pyramids...On the way home he was like 'let's run away together' and I was like 'this is my stop, goodnight.'  There was a few months of joking around at work, a few phone calls and emails but he really backed off.  I don't know why I kept pursuing it.  I guess I just wanted to feel that way again.  Later I was insistent that we should be friends.  (I worked there for a year and a bit.)  I should explain more.  This is embarassing to recall.
He....sometimes cross-dressed.  At first I was shocked, but everyone at work was used to it and I accepted it.  But facebook has been the means of many an undoing, and he kept posting stupid conspiracy theories and I would argue them with him.  He's a loser, basically, in so many ways, but I could also see a lot of good qualities in him.  His story makes me sad.  He's a smart guy who has this urge to express himself in a way that wasn't socially acceptable and was stuck in this really stupid job that was a waste of his talents.  Anyways, I learned a lot, painful as the experience was.  I'm grateful to him in many ways.

Since then, I have tried internet dating briefly.  On a dare from a friend, I signed up for Plenty of Fish.  I met two people, one I didn't like and one I did who said he'd phone me and didn't.  I'm sure everybody's got weird online dating stories.  I was surprised that people who seemed so clearly wrong for me were messaging me.  I guess some men have a strategy of asking everyone, cause somebody's going to say yes eventually.  When a friend of mine died, I cancelled the account.

I worry that I haven't 'liked' anyone for years, that I never see anyone I'm even remotely interested in.  I play this game on the bus- if you had to date someone on this vehicle, who would you pick?  I've discovered mostly females ride the bus in my city.